EAPOL Init vs EAPOL Reauthenticate

[Configterminal]

Hi can somebody tell me what the difference is between

eapol init and eapol reauthenticate on the port level on the ERS 4950s?

There appears to be a scenario, where after boot up, some devices get stuck on the EAPOl guest vlan until someone runs eapol init on the port.

Many thanks

[EF · Accepted solution]

Hi.

when you have EAPOL on port the supplicant starts a conversation to auth with eapol start packet so maybe you problem is that these devices remain in guest vlan becasue dont do it and this is the reason the auth process doesnt start until you force it with eapol init. What are these devices?

Im not sure about the use of "eapol init" but maybe the switch send eapol start packet and the auth proccess begins (you can verify with packet capture) .

About eapol reauth, I used it when I want reauth my devices every X min, I belive that when a the device is authenticated it remains auth all the time until the operational port changes (down/up), so if the port never goes down no more auth are performed.

I hope these helps you.

EAPOL INIT

VOSS CLI Commands Reference (extremenetworks.com)

EAPOL REAUHT

https://documentation.extremenetworks.com/VOSS/SW/84/CLIRefVOSS/GUID-D3824330-20E6-4C70-9750-A2C97A2...

Cheers!!

EF