Cisco Prime Infrastructure 3.0 User Guide

Working with Device Configurations

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Cisco Prime Infrastructure archives device configurations and provides information such as the date of last configuration change, status of the configuration jobs, and allows you to compare current and previous configurations. Prime Infrastructure also allows you to roll back to a previously saved configuration in the archive if a configuration deployment fails.

• Configuration Archives
• Changing Prime Infrastructure Device Configuration Settings
• Comparing Current and Previous Device Configurations
• Scheduling Configuration Archive Tasks
• Overview of Device Configurations
• Configuration Rollbacks
• Rolling Back Device Configuration Versions
• Deleting Device Configurations

Configuration Archives

Prime Infrastructure attempts to collect and archive the following device configuration files:

• Startup configuration
• Running configuration
• VLAN configuration, if configured

A configuration archive is created if there is a change between the last archived configuration and the current running configuration only. You can specify how Prime Infrastructure archives the configurations:

• On demand—You can have Prime Infrastructure collect the configurations of selected devices by choosing Inventory > Configuration Archive and selecting the option to schedule the archive immediately.
• Scheduled—You can schedule when Prime Infrastructure collects the configurations of selected devices and specify recurring collections by choosing Inventory > Device Configuration Archive, then clicking Schedule Archive .

You can schedule to have Prime Infrastructure copy the running configuration to the startup configuration by choosing Inventory > Device Configuration Archive, then clicking Schedule Overwrite .

• During inventory—You can have Prime Infrastructure collect device configurations during the inventory collection process. See Changing Prime Infrastructure Device Configuration Settings for more information.
• Based on Syslogs— If device is configured to send syslogs, when there is any device configuration change, Prime Infrastructure collects and stores the configuration.

When you execute a configuration archive on VTP-enabled Nexus devices, the VLAN database is not archived. The Fetch VLAN field displays Unsupported operation , and the vlan.dat file is not uploaded to the Prime Infrastructure server.

Changing Prime Infrastructure Device Configuration Settings

By default, Prime Infrastructure has the following configuration settings:

• Does not back up the running configuration before pushing configuration changes to a device.
• Does not attempt to roll back to the previously saved configuration in the archive if the configuration deployment fails
• When pushing CLI to a device, uses 5 thread pools.

To change the default configuration settings:

Step 1 Choose Administration > Settings > System Settings , then click Configuration .

• Click Backup Running Configuration to have Prime Infrastructure back up the running configuration before pushing configuration changes to a device.
• Click Rollback Configuration to have Prime Infrastructure attempt to roll back to the previously saved configuration in the archive if the configuration deployment fails.

Step 2 Click Save .

Changing Prime Infrastructure Configuration Archive Collection Settings

By default, Prime Infrastructure has the following Configuration Archive collection settings:

• Collects device configuration after Inventory Sync.
• Does not collect device configuration based on syslog events.

To change the default configuration settings:

Step 1 Choose Administration > Settings > System Settings , then click Configuration Archive .

Step 2 Select the Archive Configuration on receiving configuration change events check box so that Prime Infrastructure can collect and store the configuration based on syslog configuration change events. For more information about the supported Syslog formats, see Supported Syslog Formats for Configuration Archive Collection Settings.

Note This feature is not supported for WLC, because WLC does not send any syslog message for configuration changes.

Step 3 Click Save .

Comparing Current and Previous Device Configurations

To compare a current device configuration with a previous version:

Step 1 Choose Inventory > Configuration Archive.

Step 2 Click the expand icon for the device whose configuration you want to view. Then click the expand icon again to view the specific configuration version that you want to compare.

Step 3 In the Compare With column, choose the configuration for which you want to compare the configuration that you selected in the previous step.

The color key at the bottom of the report shows the differences between the configurations you selected.

Scheduling Configuration Archive Tasks

When you choose Inventory > Device Management > Network Devices , click on a device name, then click the Configuration Archive tab, Prime Infrastructure allows you to schedule the following configuration archive tasks:

• Schedule Rollback—Specify when to roll back the running configuration, startup configuration, or both configurations.
• Schedule Overwrite—Specify when to copy the running configuration to the startup configuration.
• Schedule Archive—Specify when to archive the configuration.
• Schedule Deploy—You can schedule when to deploy the configuration and also specify to:

– Overwrite the startup configuration. This option is applicable for devices that have a startup configuration only.

– Merge the configuration with the running configuration

Overview of Device Configurations

You can change a device’s configuration in two ways:

• Inventory > Device Management > Network Devices —To change the configuration of a single device. See Changing a Single Device Configuration.
• Configuration > Templates —To change the configuration of more than one device and apply a common set of changes, use a configuration template to make the changes.

Prime Infrastructure provides the following default configuration templates:

– CLI templates—CLI templates are user-defined and created based on your own parameters. CLI templates allow you to select the elements in the configurations. Prime Infrastructure provides variables which you replace with actual values and logic statements. You can also import templates from Cisco Prime LAN Management System. See Creating CLI Templates.

– Feature and technology templates—Feature templates are configurations that are specific to a feature or technology in a device’s configuration. See Creating Features and Technologies Templates.

– Composite templates—Composite templates are two or more feature or CLI templates grouped together into one template. You specify the order in which the templates contained in the composite template are deployed to devices. See Creating Composite Templates.

Rebooting Controllers

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Step 1 Choose Inventory > Device Management > Network Devices .

Step 2 Expand Device Type, and then click Wireless Controller .

Step 3 Select the check box(es) of the applicable controller(s).

Step 4 From the Reboot drop-down list, choose Reboot Controllers .

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Note Save the current controller configuration prior to rebooting.

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Step 5 Select the Reboot Controller options that must be applied.

• Save Config to Flash—Data is saved to the controller in non-volatile RAM (NVRAM) and is preserved in the event of a power cycle. If the controller is rebooted, all applied changes are lost unless the configuration has been saved.
• Reboot APs—Select the check box to enable a reboot of the access point after making any other updates.
• Swap AP Image—Indicates whether or not to reboot controllers and APs by swapping AP images. This could be either Yes or No.

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Note Options are disabled unless the Reboot APs check box is selected.

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Step 6 Click OK to reboot the controller with the optional configuration selected.

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Configuration Rollbacks

You can change the configuration on a device with a configuration stored in Prime Infrastructure. You can select a single archived version to which you want to “rollback.”

During the configuration rollback process, the configuration is converted into a set of commands which are them executed sequentially on the device.

When rolling back a configuration file you can specify the following options:

• The type of configuration file to which to rollback, for example running or startup configuration
• Whether to sync the running and startup configurations after rolling back the running configuration
• If rolling back a startup configuration only, specify to reboot the device so that startup configuration becomes the running configuration
• Before rolling back the configuration, specify whether to create new archived versions. You can also specify whether to continue the rollback if the archived configuration fails.

Rolling Back Device Configuration Versions

You can use Prime Infrastructure to rollback a device’s configuration to a previous version of the configuration.

To roll back a configuration change.

Step 1 Choose Inventory > Configuration Archive .

Step 2 Click the expand icon for the device whose configuration you want to roll back.

Step 3 Click the specific configuration version that you want to roll back, then click Schedule Rollback .

Step 4 Specify the rollback and scheduling options.

Step 5 Click Submit .

Deleting Device Configurations

By default, Prime Infrastructure archives up to five device configuration versions for each device for seven days after:

• Every inventory collection
• Prime Infrastructure receives a configuration change event

You cannot delete configuration versions, but older configuration versions are replaced by newer configuration versions.

To change the number of configurations that Prime Infrastructure retains:

Step 1 Choose Administration > Settings > System Settings , then click Configuration Archive .

Step 2 Enter a new value in the Number of Versions field. To archive an unlimited number of configuration versions, unselect the Number of version to retain and Number of days to retain check boxes.

Step 3 Click Save .