Systemd-networkd bridge not being created at boot

Question

I am trying to create an ethernet bridge with systemd-networkd so KVM guests can access the network. I am on Debian 11 Bullseye, attempting to create bridge "host1" on physical device "eno1".

root@debian-kvm:/etc/systemd/network# ls
    
20-wired.network  host1.netdev  host1.network  uplink.network

root@debian-kvm:/etc/systemd/network# cat 20-wired.network

[Match]
Name=eno1

[Network]
DHCP=No
Address=192.168.1.57/24
Gateway=192.168.1.1
DNS=1.1.1.1

root@debian-kvm:/etc/systemd/network# cat host1.netdev

[Netdev]
Name=host1
Kind=bridge

root@debian-kvm:/etc/systemd/network# cat host1.network

[Match]
Name=host1

[Network]
Address=192.168.1.2/24
Gateway=192.168.1.1
DNS=1.1.1.1

root@debian-kvm:/etc/systemd/network# cat uplink.network

[Match]
Name=eno1

[Network]
Bridge=host1

However, it's not working when I do "systemctl restart systemd-networkd". eno1 is fine and retains the network connection, and I can ping websites and IP addresses, but the bridge host1 never shows up.

root@debian-kvm:/etc/systemd/network# networkctl

IDX LINK TYPE     OPERATIONAL SETUP
  1 lo   loopback carrier     unmanaged
  2 eno1 ether    routable    configured
  3 eno2 ether    off         unmanaged
  4 eno3 ether    off         unmanaged
  5 eno4 ether    off         unmanaged

root@debian-kvm:/etc/systemd/network# ip link
1: lo: <LOOPBACK,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 65536 qdisc noqueue state UNKNOWN mode DEFAULT group default qlen 1000
    link/loopback 00:00:00:00:00:00 brd 00:00:00:00:00:00
2: eno1: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 1500 qdisc mq state UP mode DEFAULT group default qlen 1000
    link/ether b8:ca:3a:64:65:88 brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
    altname enp1s0f0
3: eno2: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST> mtu 1500 qdisc noop state DOWN mode DEFAULT group default qlen 1000
    link/ether b8:ca:3a:64:65:89 brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
    altname enp1s0f1
4: eno3: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST> mtu 1500 qdisc noop state DOWN mode DEFAULT group default qlen 1000
    link/ether b8:ca:3a:64:65:8a brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
    altname enp1s0f2
5: eno4: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST> mtu 1500 qdisc noop state DOWN mode DEFAULT group default qlen 1000
    link/ether b8:ca:3a:64:65:8b brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
    altname enp1s0f3

As far as I can tell, it should work. The files are in /etc/systemd/network which takes highest priority, there is a .netdev file with the correct syntax and name, there's an uplink.network file indicating that the parent is eno1, and there's a host1.network file that configures the IP, DNS, etc. moving host1.network to 25-wired.network doesn't help either, so it doesn't seem to be the filenames.

In case it's something in /etc/network/interfaces, but I don't think systemd-networkd reads this file:

root@debian-kvm:/etc/systemd/network# cat /etc/network/interfaces
# This file describes the network interfaces available on your system
# and how to activate them. For more information, see interfaces(5).

source /etc/network/interfaces.d/*

# The loopback network interface
auto lo
iface lo inet loopback

# The primary network interface
allow-hotplug eno1
iface eno1 inet manual

# KVM Host interface, use this to avoid conflicts, physical device is just for physical connection
iface host1 inet manual

# FreeBSD KVM bridge
#iface frbsd1 inet static
#   bridge_ports eno1
#   address 192.168.1.45
#   broadcast 192.168.1.255
#   netmask 255.255.255.0
#   gateway 192.168.1.1

I know I could just create an init script to create a bridge every boot, but that's a bit hacky and I want to fix the problem the sustainable way.

What is happening here and how can I fix it to create the bridge properly?

Answer 1

As wangkaibule mentioned in the question comments, I should have put [NetDev] and not [Netdev].

For anyone in similar situations, systemd config files are case-sensitive - make sure everything is typed correctly with the right case, or it won't work.