AP Standalone model

[LucNicolay]

Hello Community,

I am in the deployment phase of a wifi project and for this I am testing the solution before going into production.
When I simulate a controller failure (network disconnection) the AP lose their connection and no SSID is visible. Basically the terminals do not go into standalone.

My setup:
- Two XCC E1120 controller version 10.03.02.0019 in Active/Passive
- My access points: 460C and 305C version 10.2.1.0-008R

Can someone tell me if my AP (305 and 460) are standalone compatible because I can't find the information in the Datasheet or Gtack.

If yes can you tell me if I need to activate a particular parameter or how to solve my problem so that the terminals can then be in standalone if my controllers fall

Thanks 

[Jan_Reister]

Not sure how this may apply to your situation, but I have an XCC pair and universal AP410Cs. The only way to configure an AP standalone for APOS surveys is with Extreme CloudIQ, the AP broadcasts beacons even with no network connectivity, thus enabling me to do a site survey.

[LucNicolay · Accepted solution]

Hi Community,

Here the response from Extreme for my issus! Unjoy 😉

Extreme : There is no "standalone mode" for Extreme Campus Controller (XCC) access points. They are technically "thin" APs that require connectivity to an XCC appliance/controller 99% of the time.

You CAN enable "Session Persistence" so that in the event of a controller failure, APs that have existing client sessions established will stay up and continue passing traffic for those sessions. However, if those sessions require re-authentication (to RADIUS, for example) at any time after the controller failure, and the RADIUS server is not local to the AP, then the re-auth will fail and the client session for that would be terminated.

All of this is redundant though when you have two controllers, as you have indicated, which you are configuring for High Availability. "Session Persistence" is really intended for single controller scenarios where High Availability is not in play.

The whole point of High Availability (if configured correctly) is that with both controllers up, if one fails, the APs will fail over to the second and will not go down. In that scenario, "Session Persistence" would never come into play, as the AP would move from one XCC controller to the other and there would never be a controller "loss". You could still enable "Session Persistence" as an additional "fail safe" for the unlikely scenario that both controllers might happen to fail at the same time.

You indicate: "My setup: Two XCC E1120 controller version 10.03.02.0019 in Active/Passive"

In your testing, what you should be testing most importantly, is that with both controllers up and running, and HA configured, if you take one controller down, do the APs stay up and running on the other one. That would be the primary concern as 99% of the time you would have either one or the other controller up.

If you want to additionally test "Session Persistence" for that unlikely 1% "both controllers died simultaneously" scenario, then you'd enable "Session Persistence" and take both controllers in your HA pair down, and as long as the client sessions didn't require re-authentication, they should stay up. The intent of that feature is NOT for the APs to be able to run as "standalone" for any significant period of time that way though ... it's only intended to allow clients to stay attached for a brief period to allow at least one of your two HA controllers to be brought back online and recovered from whatever issue it had suffered to take it down.

It will not harm anything to have both HA and "Session Persistence" enabled at the same time and it could cover that unlikely 1% scenario mentioned above, but, there is no true "standalone" mode for XCC APs ... and you should not need it. With HA and "Session Persistence" enabled (and other best practice IT measures such as UPS power protection, switching/routing redundancies, hot spares, regular backups, etc) you should be well protected.

If this answers your questions fully, may we close out this case at this time?

The following KCS article shows how to enable "Session Persistence" for XCC:

-- ExtremeCloud Appliance - How to enabled maintain clients in the event of an AP poll timeout (Session Persistence): https://extremeportal.force.com/ExtrArticleDetail?an=000081742

[Melli22nger]

In the Old WebUI        ForAgentsOnly Progressive
Instant AP to Stand-Alone Mode:

1. Click Maintenance in the Instant main window.

2. Click the Convert tab.

3. Select Standalone AP from the Convert one or more Access Points to drop-down list.

4. Select the Access Point from the Access Point to Convert drop-down list.

5. Click Convert Now to complete the conversion. The Instant AP now operates in the stand-alone mode.

6. Click Close.