Configuring User Accounts and RBAC
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Contents
- Configuring User Accounts and RBAC
- Configuring User Accounts and RBAC
- Information About User Accounts and RBAC
- About User Accounts
- Characteristics of Strong Passwords
- About User Roles
- About Rules
- About User Role Policies
- Guidelines and Limitations for User Accounts
- Configuring User Accounts
- Creating User Roles and Rules
- Creating Feature Groups
- Changing User Role Interface Policies
- Changing User Role VLAN Policies
- Changing User Role VSAN Policies
- Verifying User Accounts and RBAC Configuration
- Default User Account and RBAC Settings
Configuring User Accounts and RBAC
This chapter contains the following sections:
Configuring User Accounts and RBAC
- Information About User Accounts and RBAC
- Guidelines and Limitations for User Accounts
- Configuring User Accounts
- Configuring RBAC
- Verifying User Accounts and RBAC Configuration
- Default User Account and RBAC Settings
Information About User Accounts and RBAC
- About User Accounts
- Characteristics of Strong Passwords
- About User Roles
- About Rules
- About User Role Policies
About User Accounts
Tip
The following words are reserved and cannot be used to configure users: bin, daemon, adm, lp, sync, shutdown, halt, mail, news, uucp, operator, games, gopher, ftp, nobody, nscd, mailnull, rpc, rpcuser, xfs, gdm, mtsuser, ftpuser, man, and sys.
Note
User passwords are not displayed in the configuration files.
Caution
The Cisco Nexus 5000 Series switch does not support all numeric usernames, whether created with TACACS+ or RADIUS, or created locally. Local users with all numeric names cannot be created. If an all numeric user name exists on an AAA server and is entered during login, the user is not logged in.
Characteristics of Strong Passwords
A strong password has the following characteristics:
At least eight characters long
Does not contain many consecutive characters (such as "abcd")
Does not contain many repeating characters (such as "aaabbb")
Does not contain dictionary words
Does not contain proper names
Contains both uppercase and lowercase characters
Contains numbers
The following are examples of strong passwords:
Note
Clear text passwords can contain alphanumeric characters only. Special characters, such as the dollar sign ($) or the percent sign (%), are not allowed.
Tip
If a password is trivial (such as a short, easy-to-decipher password), the Cisco Nexus 5000 Series switch will reject your password configuration. Be sure to configure a strong password as shown in the sample configuration. Passwords are case sensitive.
About User Roles
User roles contain rules that define the operations allowed for the user who is assigned the role. Each user role can contain multiple rules and each user can have multiple roles. For example, if role1 allows access only to configuration operations, and role2 allows access only to debug operations, then users who belong to both role1 and role2 can access configuration and debug operations. You can also limit access to specific VSANs, VLANs and interfaces.
The Cisco Nexus 5000 Series switch provides the following default user roles:
network-admin (superuser)—Complete read and write access to the entire Cisco Nexus 5000 Series switch.
network-operator—Complete read access to the Cisco Nexus 5000 Series switch.
Note
If you belong to multiple roles, you can execute a combination of all the commands permitted by these roles. Access to a command takes priority over being denied access to a command. For example, suppose a user has RoleA, which denied access to the configuration commands. However, the users also has RoleB, which has access to the configuration commands. In this case, the users has access to the configuration commands.
About Rules
The rule is the basic element of a role. A rule defines what operations the role allows the user to perform. You can apply rules for the following parameters:
Command—A command or group of commands defined in a regular expression.
Feature—Commands that apply to a function provided by the Cisco Nexus 5000 Series switch.
Feature group—Default or user-defined group of features.
These parameters create a hierarchical relationship. The most basic control parameter is the command. The next control parameter is the feature, which represents all commands associated with the feature. The last control parameter is the feature group. The feature group combines related features and allows you to easily manage of the rules.
You can configure up to 256 rules for each role. The user-specified rule number determines the order in which the rules are applied. Rules are applied in descending order. For example, if a role has three rules, rule 3 is applied before rule 2, which is applied before rule 1.
About User Role Policies
You can define user role policies to limit the switch resources that the user can access. You can define user role policies to limit access to interfaces, VLANs and VSANs.
User role policies are constrained by the rules defined for the role. For example, if you define an interface policy to permit access to specific interfaces, the user will not have access to the interfaces unless you configure a command rule for the role to permit the interface command.
If a command rule permits access to specific resources (interfaces, VLANs or VSANs), the user is permitted to access these resources, even if they are not listed in the user role policies associated with that user.
Configuring User Accounts
SUMMARY STEPSYou can create a maximum of 256 user accounts on a Cisco Nexus 5000 Series switch. User accounts have the following attributes:
User accounts can have a maximum of 64 user roles.
Note
Changes to user account attributes do not take effect until the user logs in and creates a new session.
To configure a user account, perform this task:
1. (Optional) switch(config)# show role
3. switch(config)# username user-id [password password] [expire date] [role role-name]
4. (Optional) switch# show user-account
5. (Optional) switch# copy running-config startup-config
DETAILED STEPS
Command or Action Purpose Step 1 switch(config)# show role
(Optional) Displays the user roles available. You can configure other user roles, if necessary.
Step 2 switch# configure terminal
Enters configuration mode.
Step 3 switch(config)# username user-id [password password] [expire date] [role role-name]
Configures a user account. The user-id argument is a case-sensitive, alphanumeric character string with a maximum length of 28 characters.
The default password is undefined.
Note If you do not specify a password, the user might not be able to log in to the Cisco Nexus 5000 Series switch.
The expire date option format is YYYY-MM-DD. The default is no expiry date.
Step 4 switch# show user-account
(Optional) Displays the role configuration.
Step 5 switch# copy running-config startup-config
(Optional) Copies the running configuration to the startup configuration.
Creating User Roles and Rules
SUMMARY STEPSEach user role can have up to 256 rules. You can assign a user role to more that one user account.
The rule number you specify determines the order in which the rules are applied. Rules are applied in descending order. For example, if a role has three rules, rule 3 is applied before rule 2, which is applied before rule 1.
2. switch(config)# role name role-name
3. switch(config-role)# rule number {deny | permit} command command-string
4. switch(config-role)# rule number {deny | permit} {read | read-write}
5. switch(config-role)# rule number {deny | permit} {read | read-write} feature feature-name
6. switch(config-role)# rule number {deny | permit} {read | read-write} feature-group group-name
7. (Optional) switch(config-role)# description text
8. (Optional) switch# show role
9. (Optional) switch# copy running-config startup-config
DETAILED STEPS
Command or Action Purpose Step 1 switch# configure terminal
Enters configuration mode.
Step 2 switch(config)# role name role-name
Specifies a user role and enters role configuration mode. Therole-name argument is a case-sensitive, alphanumeric character string with a maximum length of 16 characters.
Step 3 switch(config-role)# rule number {deny | permit} command command-string
Configures a command rule.
The command-string argument can contain spaces and regular expressions. For example, "interface ethernet *" includes all Ethernet interfaces.
Repeat this command for as many rules as needed.
Step 4 switch(config-role)# rule number {deny | permit} {read | read-write}
Configures a read only or read and write rule for all operations.
Step 5 switch(config-role)# rule number {deny | permit} {read | read-write} feature feature-name
Configures a read-only or read-and-write rule for a feature.
Use the show role feature command to display a list of features.
Repeat this command for as many rules as needed.
Step 6 switch(config-role)# rule number {deny | permit} {read | read-write} feature-group group-name
Configures a read-only or read-and-write rule for a feature group.
Use the show role feature-group command to display a list of feature groups.
Repeat this command for as many rules as needed.
Step 7 switch(config-role)# description text
(Optional) Configures the role description. You can include spaces in the description.
Step 8 switch# show role
(Optional) Displays the user role configuration.
Step 9 switch# copy running-config startup-config
(Optional) Copies the running configuration to the startup configuration.
The following example shows how to create user roles and specify rules:
switch# configure terminalswitch(config)# role name UserAswitch(config-role)# rule deny command clear usersswitch(config-role)# rule deny read-writeswitch(config-role)# description This role does not allow users to use clear commandsswitch(config-role)# endswitch(config)# show roleCreating Feature Groups
SUMMARY STEPS2. switch(config)# role feature-group group-name
3. (Optional) switch# show role feature-group
4. (Optional) switch# copy running-config startup-config
DETAILED STEPS
Command or Action Purpose Step 1 switch# configure terminal
Enters configuration mode.
Step 2 switch(config)# role feature-group group-name
Specifies a user role feature group and enters role feature group configuration mode.
The group-name argument is a case-sensitive, alphanumeric character string with a maximum length of 32 characters.
Step 3 switch# show role feature-group
(Optional) Displays the role feature group configuration.
Step 4 switch# copy running-config startup-config
(Optional) Copies the running configuration to the startup configuration.
Changing User Role Interface Policies
SUMMARY STEPS2. switch(config)# role name role-name
3. switch(config-role)# interface policy deny
4. switch(config-role-interface)# permit interface interface-list
5. switch(config-role-interface)# exit
6. (Optional) switch(config-role)# show role
7. (Optional) switch(config-role)# copy running-config startup-config
DETAILED STEPS
Command or Action Purpose Step 1 switch# configure terminal
Enters configuration mode.
Step 2 switch(config)# role name role-name
Specifies a user role and enters role configuration mode.
Step 3 switch(config-role)# interface policy deny
Enters role interface policy configuration mode.
Step 4 switch(config-role-interface)# permit interface interface-list
Specifies a list of interfaces that the role can access.
Repeat this command for as many interfaces as needed.
For this command, you can specify Ethernet interfaces, Fibre Channel interfaces, and virtual Fibre Channel interfaces.
Step 5 switch(config-role-interface)# exit
Exits role interface policy configuration mode.
Step 6 switch(config-role)# show role
(Optional) Displays the role configuration.
Step 7 switch(config-role)# copy running-config startup-config
(Optional) Copies the running configuration to the startup configuration.
The following example shows how to change a user role interface policy to limit the interfaces that the user can access:
switch# configure terminalswitch(config)# role name UserBswitch(config-role)# interface policy denyswitch(config-role-interface)# permit interface ethernet 2/1switch(config-role-interface)# permit interface fc 3/1switch(config-role-interface)# permit interface vfc 30/1You can specify a list of interfaces that the role can access. You can specify it for as many interfaces as needed.
Changing User Role VLAN Policies
SUMMARY STEPS2. switch(config)# role name role-name
3. switch(config-role)# vlan policy deny
4. switch(config-role-vlan)# permit vlan vlan-list
5. (Optional) switch# show role
6. (Optional) switch# copy running-config startup-config
DETAILED STEPS
Command or Action Purpose Step 1 switch# configure terminal
Enters configuration mode.
Step 2 switch(config)# role name role-name
Specifies a user role and enters role configuration mode.
Step 3 switch(config-role)# vlan policy deny
Enters role VLAN policy configuration mode.
Step 4 switch(config-role-vlan)# permit vlan vlan-list
Specifies a range of VLANs that the role can access.
Repeat this command for as many VLANs as needed.
Step 5 switch# show role
(Optional) Displays the role configuration.
Step 6 switch# copy running-config startup-config
(Optional) Copies the running configuration to the startup configuration.
Changing User Role VSAN Policies
SUMMARY STEPS2. switch(config-role)# role name role-name
3. switch(config-role)# vsan policy deny
4. switch(config-role-vsan)# permit vsan vsan-list
5. (Optional) switch# show role
6. (Optional) switch# copy running-config startup-config
DETAILED STEPS
Command or Action Purpose Step 1 switch# configure terminal
Enters configuration mode.
Step 2 switch(config-role)# role name role-name
Specifies a user role and enters role configuration mode.
Step 3 switch(config-role)# vsan policy deny
Enters role VSAN policy configuration mode.
Step 4 switch(config-role-vsan)# permit vsan vsan-list
Specifies a range of VSANs that the role can access.
Repeat this command for as many VSANs as needed.
Step 5 switch# show role
(Optional) Displays the role configuration.
Step 6 switch# copy running-config startup-config
(Optional) Copies the running configuration to the startup configuration.
Verifying User Accounts and RBAC Configuration
To display user account and RBAC configuration information, perform one of the following tasks:
Command
Purpose
switch# show role Displays the user role configuration
switch# show role feature Displays the feature list.
switch# show role feature-group Displays the feature group configuration.
switch# show startup-config security Displays the user account configuration in the startup configuration.
switch# show running-config security [all] Displays the user account configuration in the running configuration. The all keyword displays the default values for the user accounts.
switch# show user-account Displays user account information.
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