Cisco Catalyst Center Deployment Best Practices

Alright, good morning, good afternoon, everyone. Thank you so much for joining the export insight series. Thanks so much. All right, so my name is Peter Michaelandra and I'm a customer success.00:10Specialist here in Cisco and I appreciate everyone, you know, taking the time out from the to join us on this on the topic catalyst center installation options and deployment best practices.00:20All right. So without further ado let's get started on this. All right, so this is gonna be our kick start journey. So basically what we are trying to do is, you know, we are trying to adapt what your journey is gonna be looking like if you're just getting started out on Catalyst Center, you know getting to know about the product, what exactly is Catalyst Center, you know post.00:32That what are the different sessions or what are the different adoptions you can possibly do? So we are trying to build it up so it's gonna be, you know, each session is building after one other.00:52Right, so this is the 1st session that we are doing as we start our new year, which is fiscal year seven. And the 1st session is gonna be centered on installation options and deployment best practices. And also can see here the following week, we're gonna be focusing on prime migration, right? How to effectively, you know, what are the best practices to move your infrastructure?01:03If you're still using Cisco prime over to catalyst center and we're gonna be ending this kick starts, you know, two weeks from now focusing on what are the upgrade best practices for three.X version.01:23Okay, so before we get started on this session today, so we're gonna be going through some presentations and demos and you probably might have some questions that come up, you know, whenever we are presenting on some slides, right? So I do ask you to please use the slido section and.01:34Can one of the panelists confirm, are you able to see the Slido open up pop up on your screen? Is it visible? Can any of the panelists confirm that yes. Awesome. So folks, please use the Slido for any Q and A and, you know, the panelists will be assisting you with your.01:54Questions over there. You can find that you know using the three small down dots on the bottom right hand corner. Also, it should be showing up on your screen, right? Like just recent I just launched it. And if you happen to catch the QR code previously, you can, you know, log in via your mobile phone as well and just ask your questions over there. And if in case you know there's some.02:14The other issues that you for some reason you are not able to hear the audio well or you're not able to see the slides you can put it on the chat and one of our panelists will be assisting you with that.02:34Alright, so let's focus on the agenda here. So we're gonna be doing a mix of slides and demos, and so 1st topic here we're gonna be looking at the various form factors, you know, what exactly starting with what exactly is catalyst center all about, what is the product all about? And then we're gonna be talking about what are the different form factors that is available as of.02:46And the main focus for today's session is gonna be on two things, right? So we're gonna be focusing on the hardware appliance that's gonna be the 1st focus and for the virtual appliances, we have multiple options in virtual appliances as well. So we are taking the ESXi VMware as an example for virtual appliance. So this is the two main things that we want to be focusing on.03:06So this more, this session is more focused on, you know, what are the best practices you need to.03:26You know, keep in mind before you start with your installation of Catalyst Center and you know what are the things like gotcha or some questions that arises while you go through the installation. So we not gonna be diving deep on once the installation is done, how do you use catalyst centers, that's gonna be for another topic, right? So this is mainly focused on those. And then we're gonna.03:32Be looking at, you know, like 1st time set up once the installation is complete, what are the 1st time set up that you can possibly do? And if we do have some time at the end, I'll be showing you a short demo on, you know, what are the basic settings that you can possibly enable and stuff before you actually dive deep into your catalyst center deployment, right?03:52Alright, so with that let's get things rolling here. So what exactly is catalyst center, right? So bear in mind if folks who are familiar with the older named DNA Center, so we did have a branding change, a name change. So catalyst center is the same as DNA center that.04:12There's NO two different products is the same product, we just had a landing name change around 2T5 or 2T7 version, right?04:32So what exactly is this product, right? It's I mean at the bare minimum if I explain it's gonna be it's a powerful network controller and a management dashboard, right? A single dashboard, right? For every fundamental management task, you know, which helps simplify your network operations.04:40So, you know, by using this platform, you know, your IT team can be leaned efficient and respond to changes, you know, and challenges faster and more intelligently, right? And these are the different workflows that you possibly, you know, on a day to day basis you are encountering, right? You have network operations, you have your security operations, you have your AI operations.04:58So instead of having multiple tools catering to, you know, all these different operations of workflows, you have all this integrated into Cisco Catalyst Center and you can use this one.05:18Tool, effectively to manage your entire network operation. So how it does that, so we're gonna be taking a look at that, right? So think about how much time you know your team spends chasing network goals, you know, manually kind of configuring switches or you know guessing why your user's Wi-Fi is slow.05:28But what if you could just manage your network device by device and start commanding it by a single intelligent dashboard? So that is exactly what Cisco catalyst center does. It's kind of, you know, in the modern era, it's the AI driven brain of your modern network picture.05:47Right, so let's take an example by a journey of our device, right? E.g., let's say you purchase a new device onto your network, right? So you go through your purchasing your device, then it has to be in our rack stack installed at a site and then you possibly onboard that device onto your network and, you know.06:04Without certain configuration.06:23Basically you're setting up, you know, your day zero setup that has been done and then post that you might have to monitor how the device is doing if there is some anomalies or if there is some errors or that is something that you're seeing on the device. So all of the steps can be actually integrated, so if you see from a catalyst at a point of view, right? When you purchase the device, you can.06:25Automatically see that, you know, what device has been purchased. You can integrate your smart accounts, you can integrate your licenses. You are actually able to get a visual view what devices has been purchased and once it's purchased you can use the plug and play workflow or different automation workflow, right? I don't want to go into the terms, right? I don't want to, you know, like take it, you know, divert your attention.06:45But like basically when you go through all the different automation workflow, you can onboard those devices, you can push out day zero configuration onto the devices from within that same GUI center UI, so you don't have to, you know, log into a separate tool or log into a separate platform to actually do that. And once it's onboarded, right? Like the next.07:05Step you want to monitor how the device doing or you know maybe the end users or the clients connected to the how they are doing. You can actually see that you know visual view, like monitoring capabilities that you get in catalyst center, and you're actually able to see how, you know, your device is failing and get a health score and stuff. And then possibly right after that you want to.07:25You know, harden the security, right? Push out some certain configuration integrated with ice or other AAA servers, you can actually do that with Cisco you have native capabilities of doing that. And then with the AI, right? You have now AI chat features, you know, to see how your network of you have any questions on.07:45About your network, you can actually use that. So with the recent releases that we have on catalyst center version, right? You should, you will be able to have that AI system feature where you can ask more questions about your devices, get more information over there and see what can be done to improve your posture. And also there are different features, right? Like integrating AI basically.08:05Telling you there can be a problem down the line if you don't rectify something. So those are some, you know, small small things that you are that is available in catalyst center. And then finally, if you see the life cycle of a device, finally you get to see, you know, you're doing all this and then finally you kind of have to report on, you know, you have.08:25You makes you do reporting and stuff to your leadership team. So you do have that native reporting capabilities in catalyst center as well. So this is just a short glimpse of, you know, different stages, different life cycle that, you know, you probably might be facing every day.08:45But how center integrates all of that and can help make your life a bit more easier and simpler is what I kind of you know wanted to explain. So at its score, if you see it's a very powerful network management automation platform and certainly I'm not seeing you know it's complete, it's the best, there is NO flaws. There are flaws here and there, so that's where we know you.09:00Do we appreciate your feedback, you know, you might want to, you know, some, some features might not be working or something of of that sort. So that's the feedback that we appreciate so that we, you know, the iteration like the software iteration that we go through on so we can make it more robust and more complete too.09:20Alright, so, so we can see right so instead of, you know, manually if you go the manual route instead of typing that thousands of lines of CLI code on you know individual switches or routers, you know, here, what you're doing is basically defining your business intent, you know, once.09:38And then the system then automatically pushes the policies, upgrades, and security pro protocols across your entire infrastructure or network based on what your business intent is. So that's in short what Cisco Catalyst Center is, right?09:55So now if we talk about the pillars on how it operates. So these are kind of, you know, I would broadly define into, you know, four different pillars. So 1st if you see the automation pillar, right? So it allows you to provision new hardware in minutes and not days, right? Second it enforces bulletproof security policies.10:10You know, to block block any threats or something that you know you need to watch out for. And the 3rd pillar you have your assurance, right? And it kind of acts as your 24 into seven network detective, right? So it's continuously analyzes telemetry to pinpoint and fix performance issues.10:31Before a single helpdesk ticket has even raised. And finally, we have the platform capabilities, so I understand that we have other tools that we have in our system. So we have 3rd party integration with catalyst center, so possibly some of the tools that you're already using, you can integrate with catalyst center and you know better leverage.10:48Say e.g. if you might be using ServiceNow, that's something that you can integrate with catalyst center so that, you know, the workflow of creating that ticket or, you know, scheduling a maintenance window is more efficient and it's more, you know, workflow based, right? So you do have that option and you also have the option of rich APIs and stuff, right? So when you have a newer release of catalyst center, you have.11:09Have new API that's coming. So those were fans of DevOps and stuff, right? You can leverage those and automate scripting and you know.11:28Your network activities. So those are the four different pillars. So now if we talk about the form factors, right? So here you can see all the form factors that is available as of today. So towards the left, we can see a single appliance, so the hardware appliance, right? So we have it.11:36Available in three different formats today. So we have the DM three.11:56Medium appliance, we have the DN three larger plant and we have the DN three XL appliance, so these are the three different formats of the hardware appliances that we offer, and also you can obviously can make it a cluster, right? You can, you know, possibly integrate three different large appliances to form as a cluster or two three different Excel appliances.12:01Three different media appliances form of the cluster, so that's your hardware, your physical appliances.12:21Now if we go to the virtual appliances, right? So we have options over there as well. So we have, you know, options on AWS which is GA as of today. We have also option on VMware. We are also Azure which is which was recently released and you know you're gonna be seeing version three.one.five installed by default when you.12:27Use it on Azure and we have upcoming month on KVM which is gonna be upcoming I don't have the date as of yet, but that's something that's you know that's gonna be upcoming for your catalyst center. So those are the different form factors and we're gonna be taking a look at each of this, you know, what, how it differs and, you know, and then you possibly make a.12:46Position right, what.13:06Meets your requirement and then you can possibly choose which form factors you would want to go for. All right. And also we have the catalyst center global manager. So we heard you this is some of the strongest feedback that we had received. So catalyst.13:08The global manager is sort of like a manager of managers, right? So if you have like three or four different, you know, catalyst center appliances deployed as single node, right? You can use this catalyst center global manager, which is sort of a catalyst center managing all your underlining catalyst center, right? So you don't have to, you know, the, the problem gets resolved. You don't have to.13:28Individually log into different catalyst center to see what's happening in that network. You get this unified view on the top and you can individually, you know, if on that single screen you're able to see, you can log into a different site, you can see the devices, how that's performing, what's happening and all of that. So it's sort of like a manager of managers for your catalyst center.13:48Alright, so, so this is the scale, the platform scale for all the different appliances that we spoke about, right? So virtual appliances, all of them have a similar scale, right? And on the left here, we can see that, you know, this is the scale for your hardware.14:11Your physical appliances. So I'm not gonna be going into much details on, you know, what the numbers are, but what do you kind of have to understand, right? How many network devices?14:29Or endpoints you have. So based on that or, you know, you anticipate your network to be growing based on that, make a, you know, calculated judgment on which appliance would suit you better and you can go ahead with, you know, your hardware appliances or if virtual appliance is something that meets your, you know, requirement, you can go ahead with your virtual appliances as well.14:40The only thing that I want to highlight over here is, you know, if you happen to have a Excel cluster, right? So three appliances of Excel, just your excel variant and that is from your cluster.14:59The endpoints or the the number of, you know, the scale kind of increases. If you anticipate here just for a standard Excel appliance, the endpoints supported as hundred thousand. And if you have a three year three XL like a cluster cluster of XL appliances, it goes to three x, that is 300000. So bear in mind this is.15:11It's just applicable for your excel cluster and not for standard or you know your your media appliance or a large appliance, even if you have a large appliance cluster, does.15:31Scale is gonna be the same as, you know, as you can see on 2nd column over here. So just for your excel cluster that scale increases. And the other thing would be your latency, right? So, make sure that you have a latency less than 200 milliseconds between your catalyst center and your end devices.15:41And this is this scale is as of 237X, right? So you can see this are taken screenshot. It's also available in the installation guide and you know your data sheets for 2376 you can see the scale on, you know, if you wanted for that later as well.15:58So let's take a look now how we can actually deploy our catalyst center hardware appliance. So we're gonna be starting with our hardware appliance and then we will be focusing on the ESXi virtual appliance, right? So there are four different steps. If you combine that can you can you know define that in four different steps.16:16The workflow is pretty straightforward, right? And it's very important that we follow all the steps here and kind of familiarize ourselves with the, you know, hardware interfaces and cabling that we are trying to do, right? So it's very important to understand how the hardware will be connected, what interfaces we will be needing, you know, what cabling and so on and so forth.16:34And this is something that we need to review at the beginning so as you know, you kind of don't run into any potential issues down the line, right? Once your network grows or you kind of moving into forming that as a part of a cluster, you want to make sure you know you set it up the 1st time set it up correctly so that, you know, as in when your network grows or you have more.16:54You know need of catalyst center or make it form of cluster, you don't run into any problem. All right, so review the cabling and switching requirements you know use the deployment guide as needed. Make sure you have all the IP addresses subnets, you know, that are gonna be imported into the catalyst center during setup and we're gonna be looking at each of the step in the, you know, next few slides and gonna be seeing.17:14How that's important, right? And post all that, you know, the final step would be, you know, unboxing, racking, stacking power up and starting with the installation.17:35Right, so this is a quick snapshot of how hardware appliance, specifically the DN three medium or the large appliance, you know, so if you look at the back of this hardware appliance, this is how it's gonna be looking like. So before we dive deep into the software and other things, right? So let's look at.17:45So we have two sets of interface you can see that there are two sets of, you know, two sets of enterprise, two sets of inter clusters. So the four main ports, the inter enterprise intercluster management internet, you have, you know, two sets of those and you have one Cisco INC inter management controller port, right?18:04So here if you're starting up, you know, the most important ports over here is the, your enterprise and inter cluster support. So, you know, if you want to get your installation done quick and efficiently, you most likely, you know, 90 % of the customers out there most likely are using just the enterprise port and inter cluster port.18:21That is that for the installation. Now, what is exactly all this port about, right? So enterprise port, this is where we connect the catalyst center to our network, you know, through this interface and the whole communication with our network goes through it. So it's important and, you know, it's kind of mandatory to connect this port.18:41Right. And 2nd important port would be the inter cluster port. So this is another mandatory interface, right? This is most important because you know we're gonna be discussing more about it, but this is basically if you have, you know, let's say you have formed a cluster, you have three different catalyst centers, so for the three different catalyst center to communicate between each other, they are gonna be using the inter.19:01So those two ports are mandatory. The management port and the internet ports are optional, right? So if you kind of want to have a dedicated port which has access to the internet, you can possibly set up your management port.19:22If you want to, that's totally optional because you can do all those things through your enterprise port, so it's not kind of needed, but if you want to have a dedicated port, apart from your enterprise port, you can possibly use your management port and the 4th port internet port is also optional, you know, you can use that if you don't have enterprise connected to the.19:36Internet so you know if an enterprise network is kind of air gapped or it is not connected to the internet, you can use this port to have that connection out to the internet.19:56Now the other kind of recommended, it's strongly recommended port is the IMC port, right? So this has nothing to do with, you know, catalyst center in the software, meaning the software, right? This has everything to do with the hardware itself, right? The server that you you can see here. So with MC, you know, we access the server and if we needed.20:04We managed the hardware through that port.20:23So it's kind of strongly recommended to have that set up along with your enterprise and intercluster port. And if you see here on the Excel appliances, it's kind of, you know, like it's the same layout. You have two, you know, two sets of the same four ports, your enterprise internet management intercluster and.20:26You also have this that's bigger in scale. Yeah, so again, it's.20:46Make sure you have enterprise and intercluster and, you know, strongly recommended that Cisco MC port is configured. All right, so we've gone through installation with multiple customers and these are some kind of you know common questions or scenarios that we have come across and I just want to go, you know, high level overview on what why this is important probably possibly.20:53You know, it might help answer some of your queries as well.21:13Right. So one of the common question that you know like do have to use all the ports, right? So as I mentioned, right, you don't have to use all the ports. At the base minimum you when you're going through installation, the only required port is your enterprise port and in the cluster port and your Cisco IMC would be strongly recommended, so if you have those three ports.21:17Port set up configured correctly, you are good to go so you don't have to have all the, you know, all the ports needs to be configured.21:37Now come, can you combine this ports? This is a very interesting question, right? So we can actually combine our ports, right? And there are two different modes of configuration. So the 1st one would be the link aggregation control mode or the LSCP and the other one is the active backup.21:45So in linked aggregation basically, you know, we have the enterprise port, the two instances, right? Two instead of enterprise board link together and by doing this we can achieve load balancing and kind of get higher bandwidth on that. And if you go through the active backup mode, right? So we have a higher availability in case we have some link failure, right?22:03Soft to from the active interface to the backup interface, right? So, you know, we kind of don't lose the communication on on a catalyst center, so it doesn't lose any communication, so you can, you know, you can configure either in the LSCP mode or the active backup.22:23Right? Now the another interesting question here would be how do I achieve achieve or the high availability, right? So if you want to achieve high so right the requirement is we need to have three appliances set up as part of a cluster for high availability setup.22:40And another requirement here would be all the three appliances must be part of the same cluster, right? So if you have large appliances, all three appliances should be large appliances and you know have the same model and they must be running the same software version, right? So this is kind of recommended to have you to enable your setup so yeah all.22:55All Appliances should be having the same version and same subnet and installed in the same site. So you cannot have one in a different site and the other two install in different sites. Right, so other thing is here is do I actually need three appliances and, you know, three switches?23:15So the answer here is tricky, it's kind of yes and NO. For appliances, you know, yes you know if you want to form a cluster, you need to have three appliances. If you don't have, you know, if you're going with a single, you cannot enable HA.23:35Right? So with regards to the switches, right? If you go with NO backup, there is NO active backup mode that we just spoke about, right? If you just have one port or one interface per appliance switches, so if you lose access to that, you know, to that kind of, you know, that kind of.23:51Possibly leads into a situation where you lose connectivity to your catalyst center, right? So avoid that we kind of configure that active backup mode. And also if you can see here there are two instances of switches connected, so you don't need three switches per se, you can have two switches and both of the switches are connected to each of the interfaces in your, you know, you know, in your cluster.24:08Right, so even if one switch goes down, there is another switch that is actually, you know, connecting to your network and you don't lose any communication.24:28Right, but if you just connect everything to one switch and that switch goes down, right? You lose connectivity to your catalyst center. So your network won't be down, there's NO nothing happening with your network, but you don't, you don't have access to your catalyst center and you know, the perform your network operation through catalyst center.24:35So it's kind of yes and NO, right? And this is something that I answered like can I span my appliances across different data centers? So it is not supported, this is not something validated design, right? You can try. It may possibly work, but if you know kind of something goes wrong, that is not a supported method, so they can.24:51Recommendation here is to have everything in the same network, the same site, same subnet. So all of this should be in the same data center if you want to go with the high availability setup.25:11Right? Now the other option here is so I spoke about high availability, there's also a disaster recovery setup, so disaster recovery can be enabled for either if you have a single node or a three node cluster, and in this example you can see here we have a three node cluster.25:20And all the devices part of the same cluster, you know, should be, should be in the same site. If you see the main site, they are on the same subnet, you have the recovery site. They could be in a different subnet, that's fine, but all the three appliances that is there in that cluster is part of the same site, right? So in the middle, we have a VM which kind of we call as a witness site and.25:36This witness site monitors the main site, which is your active one, which is what is actually you're using to, you know, do your network operation, access your catalyst center and all of that.25:56And if this witness site, you know, for some reason find that the main site is, you know, is down. So now it's gonna be bringing up the recovery site. So this is, you know, kind of, you know, the nuances, how disaster recovery is kind of different from high availability. The main difference if you ask me, right, is a timing, right?26:05To bring back the other network. With high availability it's almost immediate because you have, you know, the high availability set up. So even if one, you know, one device is down.26:25You have the other devices up and running, you get, you know, you get connected to your network operations almost immediately. But with the disaster recovery, right? If the main site is down, there is some time for, you know, the site to actually see that it's down and then move your operations to the recovery site. So there is some downtime over there.26:34This downtime is related to your catalyst center again, your network or or anything is not gonna be down. It's just your catalyst center is gonna be down, you won't be able to access your catalyst center. So approximately like 30 min or something is what, you know, you take to switch back to your recovery site. So that is the possible nuances, you know, if you want to go with the recovery or if you want to go with it.26:51I will set up.27:11Alright, so we spoke, spoke about some of the common questions that has arised during the installation setup. Now let's look at the installation options that we have. So basically, when we go through our installation setup, you're gonna be having two different options. One is gonna be a Maglev installation and one is a browser based installation.27:14So, you know, Maglev is more kind of you people who are more, you know, love or familiar with the CLI based approach like the CLI and browser based would be giving you the graphical user interface on basically telling you what you're trying to configure, what other which step are you on?27:32So those are the two things and we're gonna be seeing more differences a demo on, you know, how does this look like when we go through either maglev or browser based instruction. So those are the two, I mean main differences I would say between those two methods. There is NO other differences, you know, what are you gonna be setting or configuring in your Maglev is gonna be the same.27:48Same thing what you will be doing in your browser base is just that it's more UI friendly.28:08All right. So the three node cluster best practices, right? So when we plan for a three node cluster, so ideally we, you know, bring up our 1st node and when we bring up a 1st node and we go to the configuration, so ideally the 1st window it shows, you know, do we want to start a catalyst center cluster?28:14So you gotta see that option, there are two options. Do you want to start a catalyst center cluster or do you want to join a catalyst center cluster? So you choose the 1st option because of the 1st node that you're bringing up. So you click that option and for your 1st node, you know, you go ahead, rack stack, install, go through the configuration, bring it up, make sure it is up.28:34Then you work on your second node, right? So now when you go through your second node, you know, configuring your second node. Now you're gonna be switching back to 2nd option that is join existing cluster, right? So you already created a cluster, now you want this second catalyst center to be joining that cluster.28:51Right, so then you wrap stack install configure your second node, make sure it is up and then you work on your 3rd. So that is how you will form the, you know, then you possibly can enable the high availability, but that is how you essentially you're gonna be forming your three node cluster, right?29:08So the 1st node is the important one, right? You start that cluster, you will this configuration and then we move to node two and node two. All right, so we do have a demo on the hardware appliance. I kind of just combined it with the ESXi because the demo.29:24On how you set up, you know, like what things needs to be configured for your hardware or if you go your virtual appliances gonna be the same. So just to save on time, I kind of combined that demo and we'll be looking at that. So now I'm gonna be switching over to the virtual appliance and we're gonna be focusing on the ESXi VMware option over here.29:44Right? So let's take a look at that. How is it different or you know how is it similar deploying at, right? So before that, you know, let's address the elephant in the room, right? Why should I even be.30:03Thinking about going virtual and this applies for anything if you want to go with ESXi or AWS or Azure, you know, or the upcoming KVM option, right? So more important, you know, it all comes to operational flexibility, right? So there is NO CapEx.30:19No CapEx because you don't have to buy a physical appliance, right? So, and there's a sustain sustainability benefit that is there, you know, you don't need any resources for any physical appliances, right? So of course you get kind of a quicker time to value. And along with that, there's another thing that you have to make sure that, you know, the limit, the scale limits are.30:35That I showed previously, if that kind of matches.30:55Your requirements, your network requirements, then by all means, go for the virtual option because it's you know faster, a little bit quicker, right? So yeah, those are essentially the benefits or the hardware appliances, right? And here you can see the catalyst center virtual machine specification and the scale numbers.30:58So these are the specifications for your if I talk about the VM specification, right? So we need 32 CPUs, kind of 02:46 gigs of memory. We also would be needing 3 tb of SSD storage and you know if you kind of want to have backups of, you know, the virtual machine then we need to have extra storage.31:18Right? And if we focus on the server specification, we need the ESXi seven.O or newer, at least a bare minimum of two 64 gb of for and the VM. And we need two VM networks here so make sure that you are planned it for your enterprise and your management.31:36And this is quite important and we also we're gonna be seeing that in a bit how that you know how what why that's important. And again the latency requirement between the catalyst center device remains the same. It has to be not more than 200 milliseconds, right? Like if it is more it is it'll work, it's not gonna be breaking, but it won't be stable.31:53Right you there will be a lot of delay in what you're seeing the information that you're seeing on on your center UI, right? And kind of won't be accurate, so make sure that you have less than 200 milliseconds, which is the ideal recommended.32:13Latency requirement alright so so there are two deployment methods over here, right? So you have the manual mode or you can go for the launcher mode, this is specifically for your installation. So the manual mode is to deploy the OVA as usual and.32:26And you know the then the power on the OVA and start with the Atlas Center.32:45So the launcher here, 2nd method is kind of an executable file, right? So it's an application you can automate the entire installation on the ESXi part. The configuration, so this is as I mentioned, this is particularly for the OV installation, not related to any of the configuration of Atlas Center.32:50So the configuration of catalyst center in both the cases here is gonna be the same and it's also the same in what we gonna be seeing in the hardware appliance. So there is NO change to that if you go the virtual route or the hardware appliance. This particular part, the manual mode and launcher mode is just gonna be for the OVA installation that we're talking about, right?33:07So let's take a look at this manual mode workflow, what we can possibly encounter, right? And this is the, you know, this is the workflow that you can see on your screen. The 1st one here, we download the OVA file, you know, we make sure that we have all the resource requirements that I mentioned, right? We create those VM networks, then we deploy the file.33:26Possibly then we kind of complete the configuration wizard, right? The step three would be entirely pertaining to your catalyst center. So you configure the configuration with either through Maglev or through web based UI, you know, whichever you are more keen on and once that configuration is done, you are good to go. Your Center is installed and you're ready to start.33:46Start using your.34:06So that's your manual word workflow, but if you want to go to the launcher mode workflow, kind of more automated. That's the one step process for deploying Atlas center. So we download the file and the launcher from Cisco and then we kind of the difference here is we have a JSON file here, yeah, configuration file, and then we kind of put in all the information that we asked.34:08From the VMware environment on this file and then execute that file, right?34:27So which kind of helps to install that OVA and then prepares us to, you know, launch that configuration Cisco center catalyst configuration. And those steps are gonna be the same for launcher mode or the manual mode. Now if you ask me, you know, what's the difference, Peter, if you want to go with either of this mode, right? The difference would be ideally the time. It's not that.34:32Right? So if you want to go with, you know, if you're familiar with manual mode, you please go ahead or if you want to go with automatic mode, you know, automation mode, you can go ahead with that. But ideally the difference comes out to be, you know, the.34:53The timing that's there on the slide over here is kind of subjective, right? But the difference comes out to be about 20 min or so, 2020 5 min or so between, you know, the manual mode and, automode. So automode is kind of little bit of quicker than if you go, go ahead with your manual mode configuration.35:03Right, so again with your virtual options, right? Esxi, there were a few questions that did come across and we collected, you know, some of those important ones, kind of, you know, the main ones that we always come across is, you know, the catalyst center on ESXi if you want to go ahead with that.35:21Right, does it have all the features as we can see on your hardware appliances? Alright, so the answer is yes for most of them, right? So, but there are some that are not supported and you can see them on the right hand side over here. Now this might kind of look like a busy slide. However, you know, most of them are not that.35:36What I would say. So all the important features related to automation assurance and AI, you can find it in your virtual setup as well. The traffic telemetry over here is kind of end of sale. The sensors are end of sale, but.35:56You know, in general, if you see we do have complete feature, you know, we have all the main feature parity as that is found on the hardware appliance. So I wouldn't wouldn't worry too much about it and then for the.36:08Limitation, right? So for the virtual setup, we do not have the typical three node clustering that we saw on the hardware appliance, right? The high availability over here is achieved by the VMware high availability feature, right? It's not.36:24As we can, as we saw on the hardware plans where we form the three node cluster and the ESXi also does not support for fault tolerance, you know, cloning Vmiss and snapshot as backup in VMware. So again, this limitations is I believe is for a very small subset of customers and you know if that's the case that you.36:40Running into, right? We can, you know, possibly reach out to your account team and you know we can have the conversation to see what other possible solutions are there to, you know, cater to that.37:00So now how how do I achieve HA in, you know, VMware? So this is as I mentioned, right, it's provided by the VMware, you know, high availability features that is not the native HA that we saw. And so if, you know, the instance go.37:09Go down. You don't have to worry about another instance will be coming up to provide that so you won't be losing access to your catalyst center, right? But we do not have native disaster recovery support yet on on the VMware version.37:24So those are some of the common questions that, you know, that we have come across when, you know, people are going through this option, right? So now now that we have answered that, right, let's switch over to the demo. So 1st, we'll I'll be showing you a demo on how to deploy your OVA file, whether you're going your manual mode or your automation mode.37:40And then we'll be.38:00Seeing a demo on how to actually do the installation, what are the different steps that is required for the installation of your catalyst center. So those demos, I'll be mentioning that when we come to that, right? It's gonna be the same across the board. It's gonna be the same for your hardware appliance, it's gonna be the same for your virtual appliance, so there's NO difference, so you don't have to worry about that, you know.38:02Is there some, you know, different options that will be presented to me? It's, it's not.38:22It's gonna be the same. Alright, so let's start with deploying center on ESXi here. So let's talk about, you know, the standalone OVA installation, right? So I do have some videos, you know, I feel that will be easier to, you know, go through the videos since it will take much more time if you kind of.38:25Go live. And this is the VMware environment, the ESXi environment. And as you can see, you know, we start with creating the VMware and we start with, you know, those who are familiar with the typical steps, right?38:45So you kind of select the OVA file, you kind of enter a name and you know we try provide the file to deploy. And this is from Cisco, so make sure you know it's a huge file, so consider some time in order to download it. Now let me pause over here. So, you know, so we post that, you know, the 3rd step would be you provide the storage, you know, provide the network interfaces and all of that.38:58But now when it comes to provisioning, so as you can see on the screen here, so there are two options, you have thin provisioning and thick provisioning. So if you're going for, you know, production environment, so I would recommend you go for the thick provisioning since the full deployment, but if you are just, you know, trying to, you know, try it out, just see how the catalyst center, you know, what are the different features.39:18That you can see in catalyst center, so you can possibly go ahead if it's a lab setup basically you can possibly go ahead within provisioning it's much quicker and you know you can select that as an option and, you know, plan to.39:38You know, deploy that OVA file, right? Let me just play this. All right, so the next thing is like once you click on next, if you kind of click get this message and you can just ignore it and the next thing is to just review and to click finish.39:49Right, so once you do that, so on the bottom side you can see that there are few tasks that's been created. Now it's starting to, you know, deploy that OVA file. So it's gonna be taking some time. So, let me just push this video further. So you can see that, you know, the tasks each of this tasks is getting individually completed. So it's gonna be taking some time over here.40:09And I think, let me push this for the right about here is when, Yeah so when so this is where you all the tasks is completed successfully, you got a green check mark and now you are ready to start the VN, you know, the CPU memory disk.40:29And everything seems to be ok and you're ready to start the VM. And once you start the VM, right? So you will be launched the option, you know, showcasing.40:49This particular view, this is where you gonna be starting with your catalyst center configuration. So your OVA file is installed, your VM is installed, everything looks good, you're starting your VM and now you are ready to start with your catalyst center installation. So before we go ahead with that, I would like to show the demo on how it looks if you go the automation.40:59Route, right? So this is the manual mode that we saw. If you go to automation route, the steps are gonna be similar, it's just that, you know, one few nuance that is there. So let me show that to you as well. Hold on.41:19Alright, so for the, yeah. So for the automation mode, right? So, you know, we kind of download this as I mentioned, right? We downloaded the launcher and we need the files such as, you know, this that we can see and here the basic difference here, the you have the launcher and you have the json file, and this is kind of an executable file, right?41:31Right, so we edit most of the things right in the JSON files if you can see here, that's a file and that's the JSON file, right? So you edit most of the things here. So whatever we manually deployed on our manual mode, you can see the ESXi host, you know, where the OVA file is, the IP addresses and all of that stuff.41:50Right? So you kind of deployed on this particular JSON file and this is what you kind of execute using your command pro, right? So if you go here, so basically what you're gonna do is you, you edited that JSON file, you make sure you saved it and then you kind of, you know, execute that. And again, the steps are gonna be similar.42:10You similarly the task is gonna be created as you can see down there and each of this tasks is gonna be you know completed for you to proceed with the catalyst center installation. So again, we have not yet started with the catalyst center installation yet. This is just for the OVF file to be installed and your VM to be set up, right? So let me just quick.42:30Click ahead here. So yeah, it does take some time so on and once everything again similar setup, right? Once everything is, you know, the task is completed, you're good to start the VM.42:49And as you saw on the manual mode, you know, once you start the VM, you are able to see that screen where you start with your catalyst center installation, right? So that's how you're gonna be doing with your launcher mode. So those are the two primary differences, very small difference, more in terms of time saving rather rather than, you know, any steps that is, you know, that is there, right? So now.43:04Let's let's take a look at the demo of our our main catalyst center. So again, we have two options like I mentioned, right? You can either go for your Maglev installation or your browser based installation.43:24Right now before we start this installation, so there are a few things that I want to, you know, highlight over here. So if you go for the physical appliance, I mean the steps are gonna be the same. The only thing you know at the start very beginning, you get to see this message, right? Like.43:35Start a cluster, join a cluster, so you kind of do that 1st and then post, you know, let's say you're deploying your 1st physical appliance node. So you started a cluster, right? And post that you will be getting an option where you either you can go for a pre manufactured cluster or you want to go to advanced notes.43:52There are two different modes.44:10So the difference between these two modes, the only thing is, you know, when we come to the inter cluster port, right? If you go with the pre manufactured cluster, that information already gotta be pre filled over there. So you don't have to pre fill an IP address over there. But if you want to have a specific IP address assigned to that port, you can go for the advanced mode and.44:12You can actually specify which IP address mode is required, you know, for that inter cluster port. And again, the inter cluster port, what I told you, right? Interport is just used for communication between the catalyst center if you if you're planning for a three node cluster, right? So it's not gonna be, that IP address does not have to route to the internet or does not have.44:32It does not need to have access to all your network devices. It doesn't have to be.44:52Yeah, it's gonna be communicating between your, you know, your appliances between your catalyst center appliances. That's the only difference, right? That's the 1st step that you'll be seeing when you're going through physical appliance. And then post that, you will be landing on this particular page. So let's take a look.44:571st we'll be taking a look at, you know, how the operation is gonna be next, so this is the UI. I mean you're gonna be starting with the Maglev installation from here. So let me start this. So as you can see, it's asking you to provide a static IP address. So, you know, this 1st step is where you can actually decide if you want to go continue with your CLI mode approach where you know you.45:12And, and.45:32Like that, the similar view you put in your IP address for all different port different configuration or if you want to go for a browser based approach, so I'll be showing that in the later demo. The steps are similar except that the UI is gonna be different. So let's for now, let's click skip over here so we don't have to go to the browser based.45:33Installation, we're gonna be completing it via maplet.45:53So let's click one skip here and we're gonna be creating that Maglev environment, right? So now once we create the Maglev environment, it's gonna be again taking some time, you know, for it to be properly launching and, you know, validating everything.45:56So let's do it, let's go ahead and click that. So it's gonna take some time to create that probably a couple of minutes. And then once that's done, you should be able to see your 1st you know option to set up your 1st network adapter, right? So right over.46:14Yeah, yeah. So you can see that it's giving you option to set up your 1st network adapter, so then like I mentioned like you need to set up your enterprise code, so this is the network adapter one which is the enterprise code and then you need to set up your cluster port. Those are the two main mandatory ports.46:31Right which you need to set up. So for enterprise port, go ahead, you can provide your IP address over there. And also since this is this has access to all your devices, you need to provide your default gateway. So only on one interface is where you have to provide the default gateway IP address. So preferably on the enterprise port is where you provide your default gateway IP address.46:47Right, so let me input that. And then once you're done, you just click on next. Right, so here we get the option of cluster port. So again, if you go for a pre manufactured cluster option, right? Or if you go with your hardware appliance, that information is all.47:08Already gonna be pre filled, right?47:27Sorry it's not there. Yeah, so this information already preferred, but if you go with an advanced option, so you it will ask you to input which IP address you want to give out for your cluster, right? And for your virtual setup also it's gonna be prefilled like you see here. This is you know like the video that we should installing, you know, going through.47:31That is an installation via the virtual option. So it's gonna be prefilled, so it's just again it's a kind of layer two subnet that we are doing routing between your catalyst center devices the communication has to happen between your catalyst center devices, it doesn't go out to your network devices, specifically for your cluster port.47:49Right, so you specify your IP address, your, you know, network, and then you just click on next. And then you have the management. It's not totally optional. I mean most of the folks they when they don't use it, but if you specifically are very keen on having an separate management network, you can possibly.48:05Create that IP address over there, right? So once we do that, we are presented an option to input DNS server IP address. So at the base bare minimum, you need to put one IP address over there. You can put more than one you know, you can create a space, you know.48:24Put a space and then, you know, create a list of DNS server IP address that you want to put maybe you can put in two, but minimum requirement is one. So once you input that, you click on next. And now the system is gonna be validating all the information that you put, whether it's, you know, the IP address is reachable, you know, it has connectivity.48:41If there is some error that, you know, it possibly is flagging. So again, it's gonna be taking some couple of minutes for it to validate. And once that validation is complete, hopefully everything goes correct, you'll be able to see another screen to continue with your configuration.49:00Right, so let me just skip this validation number. Okay, so hopefully everything went you know correctly that, you know, the IP address is all good. Now we are presented with your cluster virtual IP address option.49:16So the virtual IP address of the webs, you need to provide one virtual IP address for each of the configured interfaces, right? So if you have your cluster port and your enterprise port configured, you need to have two virtual IP addresses of that same subnet to be present here. If you have more than, you know, enterprise intercluster, you have your management internet port, all four ports being used. So you know.49:32To have one virtual IP address for each of those ports.49:52So you put those IP address over here, you put the host name, and once you do that, you can just go ahead and click next. All right, so here it's gonna ask you the next page is gonna be asking you the Linux password, so this is the password for your.49:54Account, you know, where you, you know, where you kind of have complete access, your CLI access, right? To CLI access to catalyst center, that's your maglev. So your admin credential username would be Maglev and the password is something that you're gonna be setting up here.50:15Right, so make sure you have this saved somewhere. This is gonna be your main password. And also you will get an option to specify a password for your UI. That password is different. That is the password that you will need to access your GUI, right? Once the installation complete and you want to access your Atlas center, that's the password you're gonna be using. The Linux password is the.50:28Right so for the CLI based access to catalyst center, so the password is what you're gonna be using with the username.50:49Right, so once you import all of that information here, you click on next. And here you have your NTP server again, so you need at the minimum one NTP server, you can provide more than one IP address, if you have that with a space and you can create that list.50:57Against this this is important, right? Because everything when it comes down to assurance, network monitoring features and all that needs to have a timestamp, right? So NTP server is kind of very important for catalyst center and all the devices, you know, to sync, to synchronize across. Now once that's inputted it's gonna be evaluating again the information that you have inputted so far.51:16And once that's done, you can click on proceed and this is where the actual installation of your catalyst centers. Whatever information you have to put configure, it's already done, and now it's gonna be starting to install all the dependencies, the packages and all that.51:36So here you can possibly take a well deserved break, right? It's gonna be taking some time, not minutes, it's gonna be taking possibly a couple of hours for this installation to be completed. And so let me just go ahead and, you know, you don't have to see that you know this it's being loaded. It's just showing you the different packages which has been installed on the back end.51:50And once that is installed completely at the end, you should be able to see something like this if everything goes correct. If there is some error, it's gonna be throwing you that, you know, there's some error the NTP server is not able to, you're not able to access the NTP server or whatever it is, right? Gonna be showing throwing you that error. But once everything is successful, you should be getting this configuration.52:10See your catalyst center install and is ready to use and you are highlighted two addresses over here, which is the addresses that which you gave for your enterprise port and your port. So pick that enterprise port IP address over there, you know, that link over there and you can, you know, put it in your browser window.52:31And start with your setup of catalyst center. You can log into your UI and start with your setup of catalyst center, 1st time set up basically. So installed, everything is done, all everything is configured, right? So this is how you would do it if you want to do it via Maglev.52:47Now I also mentioned, right, there are steps if you want to do it via browser. What's the difference? It's a, just a UI based difference. So I'll just quickly showcase, you know, a demo what what difference you would notice in that, right? Let me just go ahead here.53:04So the 1st page that we saw the static IP, so you just configure that and that's gonna be your IP for your enterprise port as well. So you just gotta be, you know, copying that link, pasted in the browser and this is where you can start your catalyst center configuration, right?53:18What you did in your exactly the same thing you're gonna be doing it here. All the same set of configuration is gonna be presented configure enterprise port contact configure your port, all of that same information is just that it's more UI based and at each and every step it's gonna be telling you what you are supposed to do.53:34And what is that you're configuring, right? So it's kind of more UI friendly and if that's something that you would prefer, right? It it's totally about the right so if that's something that you would prefer, you can go ahead and you know go install center via this stuff or if you if CLI is something that you prefer, right? Which, you know, many people many folks have you know.53:53Love that. They can go ahead with that view as well. So essentially all the steps are gonna be the same. There is gonna be NO difference at all.54:13So you're gonna be configuring your here it's asking your virtual IP addresses fully qualified domain name NTP server, all the information which we saw on the as well. And if I move forward here, let me go here and right so before, you know, before they start the installation like how we had that final.54:21Window where we had to click proceed to start the installation, this is gonna be highlighting all the steps that you've done, you know, all the information or IP addresses that you have provided to each of your ports, DNS server, index server, whatever it is. And once that's done, you can just click on, you know.54:40Click on start configuration and that's gonna be starting your catalyst center installation. So you're gonna be seeing like a browser UI based view on how much percentage of that installation are they done, what packages are being installed and all of that. And if I move further here.54:57Right right over here, yeah. So there you go, so the installation, you know, the installation is complete and it's giving you the username and password and then you know there's an hyperlink over there open. So if you click that, you should be able to, you know, it redirects you to access the UI. So that basically completes your installation. So the same.55:13Between UI, between the and the UI based view alright so we covered a lot of information here but I hope that that was kind of helpful in seeing, you know, how the installation look like looks like and you know, what are the things you need to watch out for.55:33What all things needs to be configured, right? So before that like there's some certain prerequisites and dependencies, right? So, you know, when we are having other infrastructure ready, how we can plan for, you know, as I mentioned, right, if you want your network to grow or you know you want to deploy more than one catalyst center.55:52So going the hardware appliance route, right? How do you plan for that? The main one would be your IP address planning, that's the most important one that you know people need to watch out for because you know when you set up your 1st Chatlas center, you need to make sure that you set up it correct, right? Even if you.56:10You don't want to deploy for the catalyst center, you know, you're sticking with single node, that's fine, but at least you need to plan but if in case you know in down the line you think on adding another, you know, Atlas Center to the node, you actually have the space for that, right? So the main recommendation here is to plan for four IP address per port, four IP address meaning you have need to have.56:26Three IP addresses for the three individual nodes if you're going for three node cluster, and one IP address would be for your right? So make sure you plan for four IP addresses for whatever interfaces you're configuring. So if you're configuring just the enterprise and cluster.56:46Make sure you have four IP address planned for those specific ports, right? So yeah, three notes are for the individual appliances and one virtual IP. And the DNS server and the NTP servers at the base minimum like I mentioned, one is required, two would be kind of recommended, so you can add in a space and you can put in the other.57:01IP addresses if you have more than one DNS server or more than one NTP server, and for the default gateway, it's recommended to put that on your enterprise port with because if that's what you're planning to use, you know, to get access to your network devices and you know access to your internet. So put your default gateway, it just needs to be configured on one port itself.57:21Right? So those are some of the main things and the other would be your container subnet and cluster services. So this is kind of, you know, these are tied tied directly to the microservices that run within catalyst center, right? So you have container subnet and cluster service subnet, it is automatically it's auto configured, right? So dedicated IPC.57:40Subnet for their appliances.58:00Is used, you know, to have that communication between its internal application. So those are your five container subnet and for service subnet it's similar, you know, man managing your clustering services, right? So those are auto configured, you don't have to provide a separate, you know, different subnet, you will be able to see that information when you go through, you know, the installation workflow.58:02Right? So this is something that, you know, we did cover how the devices connect to the switches. Again, I would strongly recommend, you know, highlight over here is the SIMC port. So make sure you have that, you know, configured and ready since it's kind of an out of band management port for your hardware appliance itself.58:24Which is useful if in case you know something goes wrong with your hardware you are able to access and see what's happening. So when you're doing your installation, it's kind of, you know, you it able to help you start through the installation and start configuring your Atlas center. So yeah, strongly recommended to have that port configured along with your enterprise and cluster.58:44And this is one of the like it's not exhaustive list but you know some of the important catalyst center ports, right? So there are a few things to note over here in terms of you know planning for your firewall, right? And you're planning for installation.59:07So traffic between a catalyst center and the managed network is asymmetrical, so there are several, you know, there are there are other ports that needs to be opened on the network side and, you know, some that needs to be opened on the catalyst center side, like UDP five and four and TCP 08:30. But take a special note of TCP 2222, it's four times two.59:22As you know, this is the port that is required to SSH into catalyst center.59:42And although the standard SSH is kind of TCP 22, right? 04:22. For catalyst center, it is 22222, right? Full list of, you know, all the ports that is required, you know, to, for catalyst center, you know, to have complete access, you can find that in the installation guide as well.59:46Right, so this is just a quick overview on what's required. And similarly, if you can see there's some requirements in terms of the the fully qualified domain names that catalyst center requires access, you know, in order to gain kind of full functionality, right? So you must configure your network firewall or proxy server for the IP traffic can.01:00:03You can travel to and from the appliances, so there's NO blocking of, you know, some of this important URLs and the services that, you know, that is dependent on those URLs to work.01:00:23Right? Again, this list is not exhaustive, but you know kind of make sure you know you follow the installation guide and see what all the URL requirements are there. All right, so this is something that I recommend, you know, with all the customers that we plan to deploy, right? So sort of like a template, you know.01:00:32Now make sure you have all the required information listed here. So you can basically just copy and, you know, copy and paste it.01:00:52When that particular view opens up when you're going through the catalyst center installation configuration. So basically it goes through all the important things that we need like your enterprise porting IP address, your cluster port IP address, host name or all that that's gonna be used as part of your installation process. So you can put that as part of a template, and if this is something that.01:00:59You would you know require the template. We can provide that to you. At the end of the session, there's gonna be a short survey, right? So if you can fill in that survey, and request this as a feedback, right? I'll personally I'll I'll send it to you via email.01:01:19You know, like a template that you can possibly use for your installation and also it shows you the image on what each port like would be saw on the slide earlier and what each port is and you know how do you configure all of that, right? All right, so coming back to the latency requirement, again, as I mentioned.01:01:33You need to make sure that it needs to be less than 200 milliseconds so that you know there is NO delay in the communication between your devices and your catalyst center and you actually get into see all the information in real time as in when it happens to your devices if something goes down or there's some some error, are you able to see in your UI and catalyst centers able to catch that?01:01:53Without any delay, so make sure that in a valid latency requirement is met.01:02:13And your end devices. All right. Now coming to the compatibility matrix, I would request if one of the panelists, anyone can put in the compatibility matrix link on the chat or you know so that people can, you know.01:02:20Save it. So once you get that compatibility matrix, folks as I strongly recommend if you plan to upgrade, you know, once you install your center as.01:02:39As and when there is a new upgrade, like the screenshot is for an older version which is 2377. And as of today, the recommended release is 23710 or 2379. Both are kind of recommended as if you go to the compatibility you should be able to see that as both releases being recommended. So you can go to either version.01:02:49Right? So what I would recommend is always when there is a new update or new recommended release being suggested by Cisco, go to that link and see what all devices it supports another licenses and all of that. The main thing over here you need to make sure is like if you see on this.01:03:08Slide on this image, right? So you have the 2960 series switch which is an older on a switch. But the main thing I would say is there is a recommended release section and there's a compatible release section. Recommended release is a soft guideline, you know, that's what Cisco you know based on its testing and stuff is what they are recommending that device.01:03:26Particular device model to be on. You don't have to necessarily follow if that's you know there's a separate release that you find it better suiting for any needs. But what I would recommend is check on the compatible release because it needs to be at least on that minimum compatible release or higher or else, you know, some of the functionalities or dependencies that is there.01:03:45It will kind of error you out on your catalyst center UI, so whenever you have a new release that's coming, make sure that you kind of check on those and and there are also other, you know, amazing features, you know, what are the licensing you would need for for a particular device or, you know, certain devices like older devices or next devices, right? Which is for data center. They don't support all.01:04:03All the functionality which you would typically find in catalyst switches. So you can basically go to this compatibility matrix and see what different features and what different application it supports. That's a good tool to have. So yeah, I think thank you so much I think you shared that link. Make sure folks, if you haven't seen that link bookmark it, so you know it's good to, good, good to have.01:04:22Alright, so let me give a quick glimpse on the different licensing. So since, you know, like Cisco has made a hard to being, you know, software focused. So this is a bigger part, you know, of intent like a software business model is kind of a bigger part of intent based, you know, networking journey, right? And.01:04:46Specific to catalyst center speak about catalyst center, right?01:05:04So the hardware in itself, you know, if you go with the hardware out in itself does not need a license, but all the devices that you're gonna be managing by catalyst center, it needs to have a license in order to be compliant. And you know, there are two main license tiers over here. So one is the catalyst essentials. Kind of you know you can you get basically the basic.01:05:07Automation, assurance and all of that good features, you know, basically.01:05:27All the favors that you would want to get started and you know get going on your deployment, you would get through your catalyst essential feature. Now, if you want to enhance that, right? Like you want to enhance on top of it, you have the advantage license, which kind of gives you more visibility, more assurance capabilities, more AI capabilities which you can possibly know if you apply that you do.01:05:31Devices you will be able to get that. And then on top of that, you have expansion part, a pack, if in case there's a need that, you know, you want a higher level of, you know, like for Cisco space and stuff for particular feature sets, you need to apply that expansion pack on top of your advantage if you need to access that, but this is some of the licensing requirements at the bare minimum, you need to have that.01:05:51At least.01:06:11Essential license in order for your devices to be compliant and to be used in Cisco Center. All right? So we understood we looked at the installation, we looked at, you know, the IP address planning, subnet planning, what goes into, you know, before we start the installation and how to prepare for.01:06:12So now we, you know, once we've done that, let's look at the 1st time steps, right? So the very 1st time we log into a catalyst center UI, how does that look like? What are things that need we need to do, right? The 1st time it sets.01:06:33Immediately after the web UI configuration is done, so as you saw in the demo, right, we got that link where we can access the UI. That's where you know the 1st step starts. And if you remember in the demo, we did have an option to set up our UI password.01:06:48Bear in mind, this is separate from the password that is separate. The UI password, right? So if you want to go ahead with that, you can go ahead or you do have the option as soon as you log in for the 1st time, you do have the option to change that UI password and you know set up your credential over there. So you can set up a new password and then you can possibly save it, right? And then also you get the.01:07:03Option to set up your Cisco.com credentials and, you know, from there you can possibly start with your device discovery and all of that, right?01:07:23So let's take a look on how this looks like, right? Once we go to that link. So, so this is the link that was generated via enterprise port. We put it on a browser window and this is how it would probably look like. You'll get it, get this message. You don't have to worry, just click on advance and click on proceed.01:07:31And now this basically starts your 1st, you know, 1st time view of the center UI, right? So when you 1st time log in, it's again it's gonna be showcasing you, you know, do you want to change your password? You know, you, you put type in your new password and set up your new admin credentials.01:07:48Right, so you will log in through your old credential which you set up during your configuration, then click on login, alright so once that's done and there you go, here you are setting up your super admin credential, this is your new password, so the old.01:08:05Little bit delayed and this is the new password which you'll be using to, you know, access and post this you can set up multiple, you know, access, give access to other.01:08:25Folks as well, you can set up those profiles, but this is for the 1st time set up. You you're setting up one credential for, you know, whoever's doing that installation, right? So put in your passphrase, confirm your passphrase.01:08:34That go ahead here and once you do that, you click on submit and then now you have to relogin again with your new credentials that you just inputted, right? So let me do that here, so click on login.01:08:50Okay? So now it's asking me to put in the Cisco.com credentials, so you can put in your Cisco.com credentials. I mean it is recommended to have something that tied to your company, not a user specific.01:09:07The only reason I recommend that, you know, if that user kind of leaves the company or something, you don't want to face unnecessary trouble, you know, that credential is NO longer working. So generally it's recommended to have a company specific and you can use that as part of your deployment, right? And then the usual software terms and time.01:09:27Right you go through your supplemental terms and condition and just make sure that you accept that. And once you do that, you are in catalyst center, and this is where it gives you provides you the option for the quick start guide, basically, you know, you can start the device discovery and all of that. You don't have to do that immediately, you can just, you know, close that option and just, you know.01:09:47Explore 1st and then you can slowly get to each of those steps, right? So this is basically going to go through device discovery and all that and then basically your setup for your 1st time setup basically requires you know creating those new credentials.01:10:07And adding in your making sure the terms and condition accepted, and then you are good to use your catalyst center UI. Alright, so now what's next for you, right? So.01:10:22So we have completed our catalyst center installation, we are able to access to the UI. Post that, you know, we, we do plan on setting stuff right cisco.device, network device, bring your own devices, managing them, but.01:10:37One important thing is, you know, make sure that you have that view on software upgrades, right? So as and when or if you're currently using catalyst center, and as and when there is a new Cisco software release, make sure that at least on the recommended release, the recommended release. So that's the reason I highlighted that compatible matrix, so as and when there's a new record.01:10:53Release it's gonna be highlighted over there. This is the new recommended release. So make sure at least your catalyst center is on that recommended release and so why exactly is this upgrades matter, right? So it kind of.01:11:13Gives you that improved reliability, you know, kind of gives you more predictable operation of catalyst center. And more important than that is the new feature, right? It allows you to basically take advantage of the latest features and functionalities you know kind of introducing the lower software version. By NO means it's not gonna be stopping you like like e.g. the latest release that we have is the.01:11:24I mean it's not recommended yet and probably, you know, we are not gonna be going that route. Three.two would be the next recommended release in that chain. But if you want to trial that out, right? You want to see what are the new features you can explore in catalyst center in that version, you can reach out to your account team and you know have that, you know, that provide service being.01:11:46Provided.01:12:04By all means you can try that. So by with new software releases you get new features, AI features, you know, greater security posture, all that is important for your catalyst center deployment, right? So, here's like an upgrade part that, you know, you can possibly take. So if you're in the prior version, so this is the kind of hops that you would need.01:12:05Before you go to the recommended release. As I mentioned like as of today, the 2379 or 23710 is the center recommended release, so make sure you are at least on that release, and as and when the three.X train or the chain is gonna be recommended.01:12:25You might want to upgrade to that. Now bear in mind there is a small difference here, like the way you do the two.X upgrades, that's an incremental upgrade from two.X to the three.exchange, that's an OS change, right? So there are some differences in how do you upgrade you not directly kind of, you know, the way you are used to with the UI.01:12:43And that's something that we're gonna be exploring in the 3rd session of the series, which is two weeks from now. So we're gonna be exploring exactly the same topic. How do you actually plan for that three.X upgrade if you are on 2379 or 23710 or 2377 for that matter I think that's also, you know, available to upgrade directly to three.X version. But the important point over here.01:13:03Make sure whenever you have those upgrades, keep your catalyst center upgraded to the latest and greatest release.01:13:23And, you know, when you talk about incremental upgrades, so keep 232.x23.X separate, that's a different that's a different story, right? But if you talk about the incremental updates within the same train, right? So there are two different options. You have the standard installation and you have the air gap installation.01:13:30So standard installation is what something you are already familiar with, right? You make sure everything is in order, you have your backup and everything set up if something goes wrong and you go through your UI, right? You go through your UI and you see there's an option to upgrade to a newer release, you just click click through that and you upgrade to that new release, right? So that's your standard installation, but we also.01:13:49Have the air gap installation. These are for specific set of customers like military or stock or you know specific set of customers wherein they do not have or they cannot have direct access to the internet, right? So it's kind of, you know, a measure to protect critical systems, right? So for those set of customers, you would need assistance to provide that link, you know, to kind of down.01:14:09Download and upgrade those catalyst centers.01:14:29Two different options, so majority of the customers will be falling in the standard installation kind of umbrella, but yeah, those are the two different options that you have. And now post this so we kind of almost at the end of the end of the session here and post this we are basically gonna be seeing, you know, how to set up your networks.01:14:33Thing this is what you're gonna be doing.01:14:52So I do realize we have some time, so let me see if I can, you know, bring that demo and see, you know, how, what, what all we can be doing after you do your 1st time set up, so let me just stop sharing here. So this is catalyst center and, you know, it's a lab environment that, you know.01:14:53And here I can show you the version that's running. It's 2379. So, you know, once you install your, you know, catalyst center, everything is gonna be showing you zero because nothing, NO devices or nothing has been onboarded yet. So for you probably, you know, it's gonna be everything gonna be showing you zero, right? So what you would, I would recommend, you know, go to 1st explore.01:15:12The different settings and different, you know, what are the different things that is available over here so that you are familiar with the UI and if you're coming from an older UI, there are certain things that has been moved and shifted. So you're kind of familiar with, you know, how the new UI looks like and what are things you can expect.01:15:32The 1st thing you go to your system and system settings, so make sure here you have your Cisco.com credentials is kind of important as already, you know, when you go through 1st time workflow, it's gonna be asking you to add that. So you have, you know, make sure you have a company type.01:15:48That is put here. And then you can also also possibly put your smart account credentials here to access, you know, all your licenses. So everything can be integrated in one particular view so you don't have to, you know, log into multiple systems to see what's happening, you know, what's how many license or dope we have or we don't have all that and.01:16:05And then, you can also go to your system three 60, right? So this kind of gives you a three 60 degree view of, you know, how your deployment was done. So you can see all the microservices here. So this is your kind of, you know, your cluster port IP address.01:16:24So if you kind of have a three node cluster, all of those will be, you know, inputted, all of those will be shown up here. And you can also see the microservices and see, you know, if the node is all of those nodes are up. If it is healthy, if it is running properly, you can check on all of that. 2nd thing that I would recommend, you know, make sure if you have ice or AA server, you have that.01:16:38Integrated, so once you, you know, onboard your devices and stuff, you know, you have your AAA service, your security posture is, you know, you're hardening that.01:16:59You're thinking from that standpoint, right? So before you kind of, you know, start managing your devices and you know start deploying them and all that, make sure your basics are set up very correctly. By basics you mean, I mean right you can go to your system settings, go to design.01:17:06Network hierarchy. This is one of the key things, you know, make sure how you want your UI to be looking like or you know how your network hierarchy to be set up. Make sure you set that up prior, you know, you assign devices to any of the sites. So basically the layout is you have buildings, you have a site under a site and then you can possibly have a building and you can.01:17:23Have floors listed in that building. So all your access points if you're planning to bring on wireless and wireless devices and all that, all your access points goes to the different floors aligning to where they are.01:17:43And all your network devices like your outer switches can go to the building, right? So all of that is in a one single view and you can see now when you click on that map, you're actually able to see what devices are there, what is the condition of the devices, all of that information. So make sure you have your network hierarchy set up properly.01:17:54The other small things I would say, you know, your device credentials, right? So this is something that is shared when you assign, you know, provision your devices and you assign devices to a site, right? You have your device credentials to make sure you have a CLI credential SNMP, if you're using V2V3, all of that set up here, and also your telemetry settings, so this is something that is pushed.01:18:11As part of your provisioning. So this basically use had very helpful when you're monitoring your devices, your assurance features, by assurance I mean right monitoring your devices if they are healthy, if there's some error or something troubleshooting them, right? So all of this telemetry features is very key in there. So make sure you set this up correctly.01:18:31And then the another feature would be your device controllability settings. So I think it should be under your, again, your system, your settings and device controllability, and here you can enable this, you read through this, you know, like.01:18:50Based on the different phases of how the device goes, whether it goes through a discovery, once it's added to your inventory, once it's assigned to a site, what are the different automation that Cisco catalyst center helps you with? That's, that's what's you know showcase here. So make sure you familiar read through that familiarize, you know, what automation capabilities you get.01:19:05Which is very helpful and kind of, you know, automating, you don't have to do it manually, kind of automates on the back end.01:19:25On how you when you assign your devices when you provision your device and all of that good stuff, right? So that's device three 60 for you. And then once you know you're familiar with, so just familiarize yourself with all these different settings and then once you're good with it, then you can possibly go ahead with, you know.01:19:31You can go to tools and you can start the discovery. You can start the discovery possibly, you know, starting with one single site small site, see how it goes, if everything you know if everything looks good green and healthy, and then you can slowly and steadily you can deploy further and further and bring in all your devices. So I wouldn't recommend doing everything at the same time, right? Start small.01:19:46So that, you know, you are effectively able to learn as well as you go through the different process and stages, and then you you know once you're, you know, very used to, very familiar, then you can you know possibly go to advanced use cases and all of that stuff.01:20:06As well. So yeah, that's gonna be discovery and then the main thing over here, you can also check this explore option. So if you click this here, so this is nicely highlighted and you know the four different pillars, AI operation, what are the different AI operations that is available in your catalyst center as to this particular version.01:20:18Network operation operation and each of this is clickable. You can actually click and learn more about it, you know, how to use that, all of that stuff. So this is something that I would recommend, you know, to see the different features, you can go ahead and, you know, check that explore option over here.01:20:38And see how that, you know, how that helps in your network day to day operation, right? You probably you might not be using everything, but possibly there are many things that you might know, you know, that catalyst center can't do that and you would be shocked to see, you know, that's something that I actually helpful in, in my case and I, I can actually deploy it. And in any case, right, if in case there's something that you would need.01:20:55For the assistance or, you know, kind of one on one coaching, we are always reach out to your account team and connect with the Cisco customer success team and we can, we are glad to, you know, help you out on that.01:21:15Okay, so we are towards the end of the session, so yeah, I appreciate each and every one of you for joining today. So once you close out this session today, you'll be seeing this pop up on your screen. So I would really appreciate if you can take 2 min of your time and fill the survey. This kind of, you know, helps us improve what, what all different things that we can bring to you guys.01:21:28You know what a different session that we can bring to you that you're doing in the session, all of that good stuff, right? And as I mentioned, if any of you who want need the template for catalyst center, you know, the installation template, make sure you put it in that feedback over there and I would send you that mail with the template attached to it.01:21:48All right? And so I'll take some time over here make sure you can if you want to take a screen grab of this quickly, I'll be good because the 1st link over here, you can go to that link to check out the for the year session and if you want to register for the for the year session which is the session that we have.01:22:07Next week Thursday and also the week following that.01:22:27Which is on catalyst center three.x. So I strongly recommendation for those sessions if you're interested on that. 2nd link over here is to get the recordings and any, you know, any follow UPS that you want, right? You can click that link and see that link, all those recordings will be posted on that link. So it usually takes.01:22:30Sometime possibly a week or two, you know, it goes through a review process editing and all of that before it gets finally uploaded, so you know having that patience, right? And if in any case if there is some delay you can also post in a comment over there. It's a community chat space where you can post and comment and the digital team who is handling this, they will be.01:22:50You know making sure that the the recording and everything is uploaded properly, right? And finally, the last thing would be for your customer success resource centers. You can find and more guides videos and virtual events and more stuff. Exciting stuff you can, you know, possibly check out over there. And I think that will be helping you more, you know, further in your deployment.01:23:10And I hope this session has been helpful for you and you learn, you know, you learn something from the session today and again appreciate all the questions, all the answers, and also I want to give a huge shout out to our panelists assisting all the Q and A over there.01:23:28Thank you so much everyone. Hope you guys have a great rest of your day and hope to see you soon. Thank you.01:23:44