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Ask the Experts: Wired Guest Access

ciscomoderator
Community Manager
Community Manager

Sharath K.P.

Welcome to the Cisco Support Community Ask the Expert conversation. This is an opportunity to learn and ask questions on wired guest access with expert Sharath K.P. Wired guest access enables guest users to connect to the guest access network from a wired Ethernet connection designated and configured for guest access. Sharath K.P. is a Customer Support Engineer specialized in wireless and switching technologies at the Technical Assistance Center in Cisco Bangalore. He has been troubleshooting wireless and switching networks and management tools since 2009. Sharath has a bachelor's degree in Electrical Electronics Engineering from P.E.S College of Engineering (PESCE), VTU at Belgaum. India. He holds CCNP certifications in R&S and Wireless.

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44 Replies 44

Daniel Anderson
Level 1
Level 1

Hi Sharath,

Thanks for opening up this forum, I have a question around having multiple LAN based WLCs, utilising an Anchor controller within a DMZ for Wired Guest connections.

Say we have 4 LAN based controllers, each with a Guest LAN configured utilising Vlan 111, this vlan is then trunked down to our User access switches, whereby we have a user machine connected into a switchport in vlan 111. When the client initially connects, traffic will be forwarded from the client on Vlan 111, and trunked across the network into one of the WLCs - If there are 4 WLCs configured with the Guest LAN, how is the decision made as to which WLC the client will connect too?Obviously, this connectivity all happens at Layer 2, but in my mind, there isn't any particular MAC address or IP address that could be used to base a load-balancing decision on.

I've looked within the Cisco documentation, and have not been able to find anything describing how the above works.

Appreciate your feedback

Thanks

Sharath,

I have been wondering the same exact thing.  At many of our sites, we have two 5508 series controllers, one being the primary and one being the secondary.  The controllers are both configured the same, however we put all the access points on one controller to avoid inter-controller roaming.  The secondary exists in case the primary fails.

The guest wired and wireless network is a Cisco textbook design.  I have noticed that wired clients often end up on the secondary controller.  I too am wondering how it works.

Thanks in Advance!

Helping Sharath out.

As it's a broadcast from the client, the first WLC to get the packet is the one that will respond.  that is the WLC the wired guest will associate with, and tunnel it's traffic to, if you are anchoring.

Steve

HTH,
Steve

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Steve I know you worked for Cisco TAC. What is your input about the round-robin ?

"Satisfaction does not come from knowing the solution, it comes from knowing why." - Rosalind Franklin
___________________________________________________________

Hi tdennehy ,

So  as per Cisco best pratices using multiple foreign controllers for the same wired guest VLAN is not supported and the results will be unpredictable

We have already opened a bug for the same (Little late though )

BUG ID :CSCtw44999

The WLC Config Guide should clarify our support for redundancy options for wired guest

Symptom:

Do not trunk a wired guest VLAN to multiple foreign controllers.  This is not supported, and will
generate unpredictable results.

However what you see in you network ,where wired guest clients show up on the secondary WLC is
normal behavoiur .

Criteria would be that nearest WLC on the broadcast domain (Layer 2) would  respond to the client associtation request .

Cisco Controller) >Tue Sep 11 13:27:42 2007: 00:0d:60:5e:ca:62 Adding mobile on Wired Guest 00:00:00:00:00:00(0) Tue Sep 11 13:27:42 2007: 00:0d:60:5e:ca:62 apfHandleWiredGuestMobileStation (apf_wired_guest.c:121) Changing state for mobile  00:0d:60:5e:ca:62 on AP 00:00:00: 00:00:00 from Idle to Associated .

Regards,

Sharath K.P.

Sharath,

I am using the screenshot below for simplicity. A small campus with two 5508-500s in it, one is the primary and one is the secondary. The primary controller has all the APs on it, the secondary sits there with nothing, but configured the same, waiting for the primary to fail so it can take over. Each controller configured for three corporate WLANs and one guest WLAN.

Both controllers are configured for guest wireless just like the drawing depicts, with an anchor controller in the DMZ.

Both controllers are configured for guest wired as well. Does CSCtw44999 state that configuring both controllers for guest wired networking is not supported?

Thanks in advance,

Tim

I will wait for the response as well. However, I will comment in the mean time based on what I have experienced. If you have a foreign controller and she is anchored to 2 anchor controllers. The foreign controller will "round robin" these users wired or wireless.  That has been my experience.

Example:

User 1 --> Anchor 1

User 2 --> Anchor 2

User 3 --> Anchor 1

USer 4 -->Anchor 2

I asked TAC months ago if this could be changed and was told no. But there was a feature enhancement request in the furture.

Great question. Cant wait for a response as well.

"Satisfaction does not come from knowing the solution, it comes from knowing why." - Rosalind Franklin
___________________________________________________________

With dual anchors, the 'internal/foreign' will round robin to the anchor.  but guest wired is a bit different.

Steve

HTH,
Steve

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Ok good to know... Is this "wired" side documeted anywhere ?

"Satisfaction does not come from knowing the solution, it comes from knowing why." - Rosalind Franklin
___________________________________________________________

I'd have to look for something more indepth, but there is the configuration guide for it.

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/tech/tk722/tk809/technologies_configuration_example09186a00808ed026.shtml

Steve

HTH,
Steve

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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HI George ,

Nice to work with you again

Yes when we have multiple anchor controller  the client load balancing is done in a 'ROUND ROBIN' way and  as you are aware we have opened a enhancement request for the same . We will work on other options we can provide and which would be feasible .

Your inputs in product feature enhancement is highly appreciated .

Regards ,

Sharath K.P.

Hi Daniel ,

Wonderful observation and great question .

Yes, we dont find any recommendation or inputs in Cisco Docs on scenarios  where  we  have multiple foriegn WLC's present .When we go through the Cisco Doc available for Wired Guest Access

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/tech/tk722/tk809/technologies_configuration_example09186a00808ed026.shtml

Two separate solutions are available to the customers:

  1. A single WLAN controller (VLAN Translation mode) - the access switch  trunks the wired guest traffic in the guest VLAN to the WLAN controller  that provides the wired guest access solution. This controller carries  out the VLAN translation from the ingress wired guest VLAN to the egress  VLAN.

  2. Two WLAN controllers (Auto Anchor mode) - the access switch trunks  the wired guest traffic to a local WLAN controller (the controller  nearest to the access switch). This local WLAN controller anchors the  client onto a DMZ Anchor WLAN controller that is configured for wired  and wireless guest access. After a successful handoff of the client to  the DMZ anchor controller, the DHCP IP address assignment,  authentication of the client, etc. are handled in the DMZ WLC. After it  completes the authentication, the client is allowed to send/receive  traffic.

So  as per Cisco best pratices using multiple foreign controllers for the same wired guest VLAN is not supported and the results will be unpredictable

I do understand the confusion regarding such scenario's as this( Multiple foriegn WLC's) is a very general setup which customer would like to deploy .

We have already opened a bug for the same (Little late though )

BUG ID :CSCtw44999

The WLC Config Guide should clarify our support for redundancy options for wired guest

Symptom:

Do not trunk a wired guest VLAN to multiple foreign controllers.  This is not supported, and will
generate unpredictable results.
Some of the other tthat changes we will be making as a part of doc correction would be

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/wireless/controller/7.0MR1/configuration/guide/cg_user_accts.html#wp1066125


1. The WiSM2 needs to be added as a supported controller.  (Not sure about the 7500, check with PM)

2. Where it says "Do not attempt to trunk a guest VLAN on the Catalyst 3750G ...", this should read:
"Do not trunk a wired guest VLAN to multiple foreign controllers.  This is not supported, and will
generate unpredictable results."

3. Add at least a line mentioning support for multiple anchors for a guest wired LAN.

Now  if you already have such deployments , ther criteria would be that nearest WLC on the broadcast domain (Layer 2) would  respond to the client associtation request .

Cisco Controller) >Tue Sep 11 13:27:42 2007: 00:0d:60:5e:ca:62 Adding mobile on Wired Guest 00:00:00:00:00:00(0)
Tue Sep 11 13:27:42 2007: 00:0d:60:5e:ca:62 apfHandleWiredGuestMobileStation (apf_wired_guest.c:121) Changing state for mobile 
00:0d:60:5e:ca:62 on AP 00:00:00: 00:00:00 from Idle to Associated .

I hope the above explanation could clarify your doubts to certain extent and also keep you
informed on Cisco's  roadmap on this feature .


Regards ,
Sharath K.P.

Sharath,

I am using the screenshot below for simplicity.  A small campus with two 5508-500s in it, one is the primary and one is the secondary.  The primary controller has all the APs on it, the secondary sits there with nothing, but configured the same, waiting for the primary to fail so it can take over.  Each controller configured for three corporate WLANs and one guest WLAN.

Both controllers are configured for guest wireless just like the drawing depicts, with an anchor controller in the DMZ.

Both controllers are configured for guest wired as well.  Does CSCtw44999 state that configuring both controllers for guest wired networking is not supported?

Thanks in advance,

Tim

That's the way I've understood, if you have multiple local controllers, then only one of the them should be configured (or at least be active) for the Guest Wired network.

The way we have our environment configured, is that we have the vlan used for the Guest Wired vlan trunked to all our local controllers, but only one has this network as active on the device - In the event that the active controller failed, then we could simply enable the Guest Wired network on another local controller.

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