Step 1

On the APIC GUI menu bar click Fabric > Inventory.

Step 2

In the Navigation pane, expand Quick Start and click Add Pod.

Step 3

In the Add Pod pane of the working pane, click Add MPod B2B.

Step 4

In the 1: IP Connectivity page, select the Pod1 spine nodes and their specific interfaces for connecting to the Pod2 spine nodes. Assign IP addresses to the interfaces. Perform the following actions:

1. In the Spine pane, click Select Spine, choose a spine and click Select.

2. Click Add Interface.

3. Click Select Interface, choose an interface and click Select.

4. Enter the IPv4 Address of the interface and click the check mark (✓).

5. To add a second interface to the same spine node, click Add Interface again and repeat the preceding steps to select the interface and assign an IP address.

6. To add a second spine node, click the circled plus symbol (⨁) on the right and repeat the preceding steps to select a spine and configure its interfaces.

7. Click Next.

Step 5

In the 2: Routing Protocol page, configure the OSPF routing protocol options for the back-to-back connections. Perform the following actions:

1. Select the OSPF Area Type.

2. Enter the OSPF Area ID.

3. Select the OSPF Area Cost.

4. Click Select OSPF Interface Policy and select an existing OSPF interface policy or create a new policy.

5. Click Next.

Step 6

In the 3: Add Pod page, configure the interface settings for the remote Pod (Pod2). Perform the following actions:

1. Select a Pod ID for the remote Pod.

2. In the Pod TEP Pool field, specify a TEP pool subnet to be used for Pod2. This pool must not overlap with existing TEP pools.

3. In the Spine pane, enter the Spine ID of a spine in the remote Pod that will host a back-to-back connection between the Pods.

4. Click Select Interface and specify an Interface (for example, 1/33) on the remote spine that will be a back-to-back link to a Pod1 spine.

5. Enter the IPv4 Address of the interface and click the check mark (✓).

   For each back-to-back link interface, the specified IP address must be part of the subnet of the corresponding Pod1 interface.

6. To add a second interface to the same spine node, click Add Interface again and repeat the preceding steps to select the interface and assign an IP address.

7. To add a second spine node, click the circled plus symbol (⨁) on the right and repeat the preceding steps to select a spine and configure its interfaces.

8. Click Next.

Step 7

In the 4: External TEP page, perform the following actions for each Pod:

1. Click the Edit icon () to the right of the External TEP pane.

   The External TEP dialog box opens.

2. Enter a subnet address in the External TEP Pool field. The subnet mask must be less than 30.

   Using the subnet you specify, the Data Plane TEP IP and Unicast TEP IP are automatically populated.

3. To add a router ID for a Fabric Node, click the Edit icon () to the right of each Fabric Node, enter a Router ID, and click the check mark (✓).

4. Click Save.

5. Click Next.

Step 8

In the 5: Confirmation page, review the Pod details and the list of policies the wizard will create. Perform the following actions:

1. Review the nodes, interfaces, and addresses.

2. Click Set Custom Policy Names to review the auto-generated names of the policies to be created.

   You can use the auto-generated names or change the name of any policy.

3. Click Save.

Step 9

Click Save.

Step 1

On the APIC GUI menu bar click Fabric > Inventory.

Step 2

In the Navigation pane, choose Fabric Membership.

Step 3

In the work pane, click the Nodes Pending Registration tab.

Step 4

In the Nodes Pending Registration table, locate a switch with an ID of 0 or a newly connected switch with the serial number you want to register.

Step 5

Right-click the row of that switch, choose Register, and perform the following actions:

1. Verify the displayed Serial Number to determine which switch is being added.

2. Configure the Pod ID, Node ID, Node Name, and Role.

3. Click Register.

Step 6

Repeat the registration for each Pod2 node in the Nodes Pending Registration table.

Step 1

Connect the Multi-Pod Spines Back-to-Back links between pods.

Step 2

Add logical interface profiles for the back-to-back interfaces, starting with Pod1 interfaces and followed by Pod2 interfaces.

1. On the menu bar, choose Tenants > Infra.

2. In the Navigation pane, choose Networking > L3Outs > l3out_name > Logical Node Profiles > logical_node_profile_name > Logical Interface Profiles.

3. In the Work pane, choose Actions > Create Interface Profile.

4. In Create Interface Profile, fill out the fields as necessary, then click + in the Routed Sub-Interfaces table.

5. In Routed Sub-Interfaces, put a check in the MultiPod Direct box and fill out the other the fields as necessary, then click OK.

   Repeat this substep for each interface.

6. Put a check in the Config Protocol Profiles box, then click Next.

7. For OSPF Policy, choose an existing profile or create a new one.

8. Click Finish.

Step 3

Establish an SSH connection to the Pod1 spine node and verify that OSPF neighborship is formed between the back-to-back spine interfaces in addition to the existing OSPF neighborship with the IPN device. Use the CLI command shown in the following example:

Spine201# vsh -c "show ip ospf multiPodDirect neighbors vrf overlay-1"

 OSPF Process ID multiPodDirect VRF overlay-1
 Total number of neighbors: 4
 Neighbor ID          Pri State          Up Time  Address            Interface
 192.168.11.111       1 FULL/ -          10:07:18 192.168.1.2        Eth1/32.47
 192.168.11.112       1 FULL/ -          10:07:01 192.168.1.10       Eth1/16.46
 192.168.11.112       1 FULL/ -          10:07:01 192.168.1.14       Eth1/4.49
 192.168.11.111       1 FULL/ -          10:07:16 192.168.1.6        Eth1/25.48

Step 4

For each logical interface profile that contains an IPN link configuration, save the profile for later use.

1. On the menu bar, choose Tenants > Infra.

2. In the Navigation pane, expand Networking > L3Outs > l3out_name > Logical Node Profiles > logical_node_profile_name > Logical Interface Profiles.

3. Right-click a logical interface profile that contains an IPN link configuration and choose Save as ....

   Repeat this substep for each logical interface profile.

Step 5

When OSPF sessions are established, remove the IPN-connected logical interface profiles from Tenants > Infra > Networking > L3Outs > name > Logical Node Profiles > name > Logical Interface Profiles and remove the IPN links.

Step 6

Verify that all devices are reachable between pods by using the acidiag fnvread CLI command.

Step 7

Verify inter-pod communication.

Step 1

Connect the IPN links between pods.

Step 2

On the menu bar, choose Tenants > Infra.

Step 3

In the Navigation pane, choose Networking > L3Outs > l3out_name > Logical Node Profiles > logical_node_profile_name > Logical Interface Profiles.

Step 4

If you saved the IPN-connected logical interface profiles before migrating to Multi-Pod Spines Back-to-Back, then for each logical interface profile that will connect a spine to the IPN, right-click the profile in the Navigation pane and choose Post ... to upload the previously-saved logical interface profile file.

Step 5

If you did not save the IPN-connected logical interface profiles before migrating to Multi-Pod Spines Back-to-Back, configure the IPN-facing interfaces for each spine connected to the IPN network in the respective logical interface profiles.

Step 6

Configure any other required settings for IPN, such as Cisco ACI Multi-Pod QoS translation.

Step 7

Verify that the IPN network nodes are configured properly and OSPF neighborship is up on the IPN nodes for both the Pod spines.

Step 8

Remove the Multi-Pod Spines Back-to-Back back-to-back interfaces from Pod1, followed by Pod2.

Step 9

Verify that all devices are reachable between pods by using the acidiag fnvread CLI command.

Step 10

Verify inter-pod communication.