Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller Release Notes, Release 12.1.3b

September 13, 2023

Added links to relevant documents in New Software Features.

September 12, 2023

Additional open issue CSCwh53141.

August 23, 2023

Release 12.1.3b became available.

Nexus Dashboard

3.0.1f

Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller

12.1.3b

Performance and Scalability

Layer 4 to Layer 7 service load balancing, and traffic steering and redirection for a single site using enhanced policy-based redirect (ePBR)

Support is available for Layer 4 to Layer 7 service load balancing, and traffic steering and redirection for a single site using enhanced ePBR.

Base Functionality

IPv6 support

Prior releases of Nexus Dashboard supported either pure IPv4 or dual stack IPv4/IPv6 (for management network only) configurations for the cluster nodes. With release 3.0(1), Nexus Dashboard supports pure IPv4, pure IPv6, or dual stack IPv4/IPv6 configurations for the cluster nodes and services.

For more information about IPv4 and IPv6 Support, see the Nexus Dashboard Deployment Guide.

Ease of Use

Enhanced License Management workflow

The workflow for the License Management feature has been enhanced to make it easier to configure license management in the NDFC. With 12.1.3b, you can configure switched-based licenses, NDFC smart licenses, or a combination of both in a streamlined manner.

For more information, see

Base Functionality

Private VLAN support in Data Center VXLAN EVPN Fabric

NDFC supports provisioning of private VLANs in Data Center VXLAN EVPN, BGP with EVPN VXLAN enabled, and External fabrics. The overlay network deployment workflow is enhanced to support flexible provisioning of primary and secondary VLANs on Virtual Tunnel End Points (VTEPs).

For more information, see About Fabric Overview for LAN Operational Mode Setups.

Shared Group Policy

You can now create group policies for switches that share common configurations. Policy groups provides a method of configuring and managing switches collectively.

For more information, see About Fabric Overview for LAN Operational Mode Setups.

VXLANv6 support in BGP fabrics

BGP fabric now supports EVPN VXLAN fabric with IPv6 as the underlay. VXLANv6 BGP fabric supports IPv6 link local address for intra-fabric links and eBGP unnumbered peering between the switches.

For more information, see BGP Fabric.

Super-Spine support in BGP fabrics

BGP fabric now supports Super-Spine and Border Super-Spine roles on VXLAN EVPN fabrics with BGP as the underlay protocol.

For more information, see BGP Fabric.

Unique IP address allocation for Virtual Routing and Forwarding (VRF) extensions

Support is available for automatically allocating a unique IPv4 address for the source and the destination interfaces for VRF extensions using VRF Lite Inter-Fabric Connection (IFC).

For more information, see Data Center VXLAN EVPN.

Loopback IP address allocation on VTEPs for VRF attachment

NDFC automatically allocates an IPv4 address from the IP address pool assigned to the loopback interfaces on VTEPs for each VRF instance.

For more information, see Data Center VXLAN EVPN.

Ease of Use

Single-node virtual Nexus Dashboard (vND) deployment

NDFC now supports single-node vND deployment (Production Deployments) for Fabric Controller and Fabric Discovery modes for up to 50 switches.

For more information, see Verified Scalability Guide for Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller.

Enhanced Classic LAN Fabric support for greenfield and brownfield deployments

A new fabric template is available for automated provisioning of 3-tier Access-Aggregation-Core related vPC deployments. This includes easy provisioning of FHRP and VRF Lite connectivity on the Aggregation-Core tiers, with support for greenfield and brownfield deployments of Nexus 7000 and 9000 switches. The Classic LAN, Enhanced Classic LAN, and External Connectivity Network fabrics can be part of a Fabric Group.

For more information, see:

Ability to export multiple templates

You can now export multiple template configuration files to a local directory.

For more information, see Templates.

One view for multi-cluster NDFC deployments

When you federate multiple NDFC-managed fabric clusters in Nexus Dashboard, you can view their aggregated status information in the One View Dashboard for NDFC LAN. This allows a remote user to monitor a multi-cluster network from one screen.

For more information, see One View Dashboard for NDFC LAN.

Ability to clear invalid alarms

You can now clear fabric discovery-related invalid alarms from Event Analytics.

For more information, see Event Analytics.

Interoperability

VXLAN EVPN Multi-Site across Data Center and Campus VXLAN fabrics

You can now deploy Campus EVPN VXLAN fabrics as member fabrics in VXLAN EVPN Multi-Site fabric.

For more information, see VXLAN EVPN Multi-Site.

Layer 4 to Layer 7 Services support for Virtual Network Functions (VNF) attachment

You can now use remote peering for Virtual Network Functions (VNF) Layer 4 to Layer 7 service devices, which allows for the separation of a VNF service node’s control plane peering from the physical port attachment. Support is also available for configuring per-VRF peering through the vPC peer-link so that you do not have to configure the vPC advertise-pip setting for all the vPC pairs in a fabric.

For more information, see Layer 4 to Layer 7 Services Configuration.

Nexus 9000 Series switches supported on Campus VXLAN EVPN fabric

Existing Campus VXLAN EVPN fabric supports automating and managing enterprise Campus VXLAN BGP EVPN networks with Catalyst 9000 series switches. With this release, you can integrate a Nexus 9000 switch with border gateway functionality to connect remote Data Centers and Campus with VXLAN EVPN Multi-Site Layer 2 and Layer 3 extensions.

For more information, see Campus VXLAN EVPN.

Licensing

Licensing support for third-party devices

Licenses for third-party devices are supported in the Data Center Networking (DCN) Essentials subscription. You can purchase the DCN Essentials subscription for Arista and Juniper devices onboarded on NDFC.

For more information, see License Management.

Security

Intent-based change control management

You can track configuration changes using a unique ticket that is associated with an action.

For more information, see Change Control and Rollback.

Rollback capability of change control tickets

This feature allows you to roll back deployed or undeployed change control tickets in situations where a change was started but then a decision was made to abandon that change.

For more information, see Change Control and Rollback.

Performance and Scalability

Basic performance monitoring for Catalyst 9000 switches

You can monitor CPU utilization, inbound and outbound traffic, and temperature data of Catalyst switches.

For more information, see About Fabric Overview for LAN Operational Mode Setups.

Upgrade/Downgrade

Cisco Catalyst 9000 Out-of-Band (OOB) Plug and Play (PnP)

This feature simplifies the process of onboarding new devices with a zero-touch deployment experience. PnP automates the day-zero provisioning of Cisco Catalyst 9000 Series switches using NDFC.

For more information, see Out-of-Band PnP in Campus VXLAN EVPN Fabrics.

Software Image Management and Return Material Authorization (RMA)

All functionalities of NDFC Image Management and RMA features are available for the Cisco Catalyst switches.

For more information, see Add Switches for LAN Operational Mode.

Base Functionality

Sub-interface support

A new fabric template is added to support sub-interfaces with Non-Blocking Multicast (NBM) active and passive modes. You can use the same sub-interfaces to create intra-fabric links between switches in an IPFM fabric.

Ability to manage interface and sub-interface multicast bandwidth capacity

Using IPFM interface templates, you can manage and distribute multicast bandwidth capacity among physical and sub-interfaces.

Security

Real-time PTP notifications

You can subscribe to switch-related real time events to get additional notifications for PTP grandmaster clock, parent clock or PTP port status changes.

Base Functionality

Automatic registration of syslogs

Support is available for switches to automatically configure syslog and send syslog messages to the NDFC server.

For more information, see Event Analytics.

Enhancements to Feature Management

Fibre Connection (FICON) in Feature Management enables switch communication with IBM z Systems Mainframes. When enabled, NDFC provides details about the FICON interfaces on the switches.

For more information, see Overview and Initial Setup of Cisco NDFC.

Integration of Fabric-Device Management Interface (FDMI) and Read Diagnostics Parameters (RDP)

NDFC introduces additional monitoring features for Host and Storage Devices. FDMI retrieves management information about the attached Fibre Channel HBAs and host operating systems. RDP provides diagnostic data from the switch and the connected end devices which you can use for analyzing and troubleshooting link issues.

For more information, see

Ease of Use

Enhancements to SAN Controller Dashboard

SAN Controller Dashboard now displays details about the top 10 congested end devices and Inter Switch Links (ISL).

For more information, see Overview and Initial Setup of Cisco NDFC.

Navigation changes to Hosts and Storage Devices

With this release, the configuration pages for Hosts and Storage Devices are available from SAN > Hosts and SAN > Storage Devices. Prior to this release, these features were available in the SAN Dashboard.

For more information, see

Optics alerts with alarm policies

You can configure alarm policies to monitor Rx/Tx power, current and voltage for a switch interface.

For more information, see Event Analytics.

Zone migration

You can migrate SAN zones from a Brocade switch to an MDS switch using the Zone Migration wizard. NDFC also provides an option to view the list of unzoned end devices in a fabric.

For more information, see Configure Zoning.

Execute CLI feature

The Execute CLI feature has been updated with the following enhancements:

For more information, see Add Switches for SAN Operational Mode.

Enabling or disabling switch interfaces

You can run the shutdown or no shutdown commands on a switch interface. NDFC also supports adding a description for an interface.

For more information, see About Fabric Overview for SAN Operational Mode Setups.

Ability to download Device Manager application

With this release, you can download and install a standalone Device Manager application on your local system.

For more information, see Add Switches for SAN Operational Mode.

New and improved NPV configuration workflow

The NPV configuration wizard simplifies configuring NPV links.

For more information, see Add SAN Links.

Interoperability

Support for app node deployments with SAN Insights

Prior to the NDFC 12.1.3b release, SAN Insights was supported on physical and data nodes. With this release, the SAN Insights feature is also supported on app node deployments for Nexus Dashboard; however, the app node supports SAN Insights at the Initiator-Target (IT) flow level only.

For more information, see SAN Insights.

Performance and Scalability

Support for management and data interfaces in a single subnet

With this release, for SAN deployments, the management and data interfaces on a Nexus Dashboard node can now be in a single subnet.

For more information, see Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller Installation and Upgrade Guide, Release 12.1.3.

Performance monitoring and slow drain data collection with NX-API

For Cisco MDS 9000 Series switches using NX-OS release 9.x and later, performance monitoring data is polled using NX-API for fibre channel. In addition, the slow drain job is integrated with performance monitoring and runs together with the performance monitoring collection for 24 hours, by default.

For more information, see About Fabric Overview for SAN Operational Mode Setups.

Security

●   ACS versions 4.0, 5.1, 5.5, and 5.8

●   ISE version 2.6

●   ISE version 3.0

●   Telnet Disabled: SSH Version 1, SSH Version 2, Global Enforce SNMP Privacy Encryption.

●   Web Client: HTTPS with TLS 1, 1.1, 1.2, and 1.3

CSCwe53978

Persistent configuration difference is observed for ‘ip dhcp relay address’ command.

12.1.2 and later

CSCwe60313

When creating port-channel interfaces on Cisco Catalyst 9000 series switches, your deployment might fail and display one of the following messages:

12.1(2p) and later

CSCwf12259

For a SAN fabric, the timelines beneath the graph on Congestion Analysis are not accurately aligned for the interface graphs.

12.1.3b and later

CSCwf14008

On SAN Insights for a host, the Rx/Tx graphs for a switch interface appears as truncated.

12.1.3b and later

CSCwh08204

If a primary node with Elasticsearch in a 3-node cluster shuts down, the active alarm pod goes down and becomes active on another node. In this case, Operations > Event Analytics > Alarms > Alarms Policies may not show any default or existing policies.

12.1.3b and later

CSCwh15025

When deleting Border Gateway switches with overlay extensions which has 'Force delete border role switches' enabled, the system may not remove some switches at the first attempt.

12.1.3b and later

CSCwh24600

The Cluster View does not display a dual-stack setup and hence the associated configuration data is not accessible on the unified One View Dashboard.

12.1.3b and later

CSCwh26528

The credentials from Credentials Management System (CMS) that appear on Actions > Edit Fabric misses an entry of UCS SNMP credential. This happens due to a schema change after restoring NDFC from 11.5.4 to 12.1.x. However, this does not have an impact on SAN discovery as it reconstructs the UCS SNMP user and saves to its own cache.

12.1.3b and later

CSCwh28637

After you enter the scale limits in Nexus Dashboard and enable Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller (NDFC) for the first time, the system generates an error message and fails to enable NDFC.

12.1.3b and later

CSCwh29489

The address family for VRF context of BGP gets negated in Pending Config when Export Gateway IP for service_static_route and service_ebgp_route templates is changed from enabled to disabled in the Route Peering of L4-L7 services for VXLAN EVPN fabric.

12.1.3b and later

CSCwh29913

Missing policies or configuration diffs are observed after manual RMA on the Catalyst 9K switches in a Campus VXLAN EVPN fabric.

12.1.3b and later

CSCwh30266

When you run pre-ISSU and post-ISSU reports using the custom_swift_issu template on a switch, the post-ISSU report fails for the 'Validate License Usage' category in the report.

12.1.3b and later

CSCwh30277

When you perform an install or upgrade using a Software Maintenance Upgrades (SMU) image, the upgrade status fails to change from out-of-sync to in-sync.

12.1.3b and later

CSCwh31460

While performing Recalculate & Deploy, you may get a traceback with getPersistentIp(): expected 2 args.

12.1.3b and later

CSCwh35272

While performing a Recalculate & Deploy on switches that are imported with preserve-config ‘yes’ in an Enhanced Classic Lan fabric (Brownfield migration), the following error appears:

Error updating VRF Id [50000] Name [default]. Reason [OSPFv3 Process Tag needs to be defined in Fabric Settings for VRF default of IP version IPv4_and_IPv6]

12.1.3b and later

CSCwh53141

After a reload of any one of the nodes, all the fabric data may appear to be lost in NDFC user interface.

12.1.3b and later

CSCwb80045

Deploy of one network changes status of other pending nw to deployed for interface attach/detach.

12.1.3

CSCwd86943

[MSG Scale] power off one node (pnd2) and config status changed to NA for many switches.

12.1.3

CSCwd95598

Network Export failed to save "dhcpServers" fields properly.

12.1.1

CSCwd98202

Longevity: telemetry-sycn status API failing on flows/RTP flow monitoring page.

12.1.3

CSCwe00204

API output is getting truncated for allowed vlan list.

12.1.3

CSCwe05045

[LAN]: Action menu items for events under fabric overview and switch overview are greyed out.

12.1.3

CSCwe12223

IPFM Longevity: CDB pod reset 137.

12.1.3

CSCwe12281

Quick detach of network with IG on leaf and tor interfaces deployed.

12.1.3

CSCwe21895

Navigating to NDFC URL in browser address is reaching ND-OneView after sign-in - bookmarks fail.

12.1.3

CSCwe52834

Error message in fabric setting page states to enable promiscuous mode.

12.1.3

CSCwd85885

Network creation error on upgraded setup.

12.0.1a

CSCwd84563

Upgrade to v2.3 from v2.1.2d - No warning messages to disable old App/containers.

Nexus Dashboard Release 2.1.2d

CSCwf66965

After the upgrade to release 12.1.3b, the default VRF is no longer deployed.

12.1.1

CSCwh62924

vCenter Visualization plugin crash when VMware DVS configured with PVLAN.

Releases prior to 12.1.3b