Networklearner: AP group configuration

Cisco gives us the flexibility to select which AP should advertise what SSIDs. In some scenarios, where we need that our internal corporate SSID should not be advertised to some areas like cafeteria or reception. We can design our network to meet such requirement using AP group.

Follow below procedure to configure AP group on a controller.

Step1. Go to WIRELESS -> RF PROFILES -> click NEW to create new RF profiles.

Step2. Create RF profile for 802.11a radio. Give the name to RF Profile and select the Radio type and press APPLY.

Step3. As you press APPLY, below window will appear which gives you option to select threshold values and data rates and press APPLY.

Step4. 802.11a profile is ready and now we need to create profile for 802.11b/g radio. Click NEW to proceed.

Step 5. Give name and select the radio type as we have done for 802.11 a radio. Press APPLY.

Step6. Profile edit window will appear as you press apply. Choose the data rates and threshold values for 9-2.11b/g radio. Please be careful in enabling the low data rates as it can impact to overall performance of wireless network.

As per best practice disable the 802.11.b radio data rates.

Step7. Click WIRELESS-> RF PROFILES to see the list of profiles created so far.

Step8.Go to WLANs -> ADVANCED and press ADD GROUP to create new add groups.

By default there is only one group present i.e DEFAULT GROUP. All the APs which associate with WLC will be part of this group.

Step9. Give the name and description and press ADD to proceed.

Step10. As you press ADD, it will add the group in the AP group list. At this point group has been created but no customization has been done.

Step11. Click AP group name to start the customization of the group. Under the GENERAL tab we can edit the description given in above step.

Step12. By default there is no WLAN select on the new group created. Press ADD NEW button to select the SSIDs.

Step13. Select the WLAN and its interface. Interface selected here will overwrite the interface setting done under the WLAN.

AP1 is part of the AP group “ LAB-AP-GROUP”. And LAB-INTERFACE2 is selected as interface under WLAN setting. If we select the LAB-interface1 here under AP group, all the users which will associate to AP1 and connect to SSID” LAB_WLAN1” will get IP address from interface “LAB-INTERFACE1” not from LAB-INTERFACE2.

By doing this we have the flexibility to provide different IP addresses to the users present in different areas.

Step14. As you press enter, WLAN will become part of this AP group and all the APs under this AP group will start advertising LAB-wlan1 SSID.

We can add or delete SSID at any point of time.

Step15. Select the RF profiles created before.

Step16. Last part is to add APs to AP group. As mentioned before by default all APs are part of DEFAULT GROUP. Select the APs which you want to move from default to new AP group. Select the AP and press ADD APs tab.

Step17. As you press ADD APs, we will get the below warning which suggest that all the selected APs will reboot in order to reflect the new settings done under AP GROUP.

Step18. Once the AP boots up, you can see the AP under the selected AP group.

Step19. You can also remove the AP from an AP group. It is very similar as we have added the AP in particular group. Just select the APs and click REMOVE APs.