Accelar VLAN Manager

Contents:

  1. What is a VLAN?
  2. VLAN Manager Application
  3. Domains
  4. VLAN View
  5. Device View
  6. Operations:
    1. Creating a new VLAN
    2. Deleting an existing VLAN
    3. Renaming a VLAN
    4. Moving ports from one VLAN to another
    5. Creating Trunk ports

What is a VLAN?

A Virtual LAN can best be described as a bridge or broadcast domain with fluid boundaries that are determined by management software rather than router interfaces. Workgroups are organized to support fluid project structures. VLAN members can share resources without having to move to the same physical LAN segment. VLAN membership can be determined by switch port, IP subnet, or protocol type.

VLAN Manager Application

This application is designed to help you manage VLANs on one or more Accelar switches. A managed collection of switches is called a domain.

The application window contains a menubar, toolbar, VLAN view, and a status bar. Buttons in the toolbar are accelerators for frequently used operations that also appear in the menubar:

  1. toggle between displaying members by VLAN or by device.
  2. open domain.
  3. tidy icons in view.
  4. create a new VLAN.
  5. delete the selected VLAN.
  6. print the current view.
  7. display online help.

Domains

One or more devices can be opened at any time by pressing the Open Domain button. Select the domain you wish to manage or press the Open button. Any errors will be displayed on the status line and a progress bar will provide feedback on the operation's duration.

If you want to create or delete domains or update the device list in a domain, press the Edit button. This will update the dialog as so:

Two lists are displayed together with entry fields beneath them. In the previous example, there are two domains. RapidCity is open and the member switches - vx3 and vx4 - are displayed together with their community strings. In edit mode, double-clicking a domain will list its membership in the rightmost listbox. (Since community strings are displayed openly, this information should be stored securely.)

Validation

Checks are performed for five different errors on each VLAN as it is read from the devices:
  1. Same ID, different Name: two devices define the same VLAN ID but use different names.
  2. Same ID, different Type: two devices define the same VLAN ID but have different types.
  3. Same ID, different Subtypes: two devices define the same VLAN ID but have different protocols or subnet addresses.
  4. Same ID, different STG ID: two devices define the same VLAN ID but have different STG IDs.
  5. Same ID, different Priority: two devices define the same VLAN ID but have different priorities.
These errors are recorded in the Error log which can be displayed from View->Error Log.

Vlan View

The VLAN View has three elements:
  • Trunk. Trunk ports are displayed horizontally on the trunk line. Trunk ports can be a member of multiple VLANs and are used to transport data between VLANs.
  • Unassigned. Routable ports and ports that are not VLAN members are displayed vertically in the Unassigned box.
  • Spanning Tree Group (STG). STGs are used to physically segmented ports on switches. An STG can have multiple VLANs within it. No VLAN may span multiple STGs.

    • Each VLAN is displayed vertically with its members. The VLAN colors are used to facilitate identification. There are two kinds of VLANs:

    1. Static or port-based VLANs
    2. Policy-based VLANs.
    Port-based VLANs have static memberships; they won't change regardless of which device is connected to the port until a management configuration change.

    Policy-based VLANs have dynamic port memberships depending on what traffic is seen on the port. For example, All IPX traffic can belong to the IPX VLAN. All traffic between IP subnet 38.242.32.0 belongs to the green VLAN, and so on. You have the option of statically configuring ports to a dynamic VLAN. This means that, for example, port 1/1 must always be a member of the IPX VLAN. You can also manually prevent certain ports from ever becoming a member of a particular dynamic VLAN.

    You can toggle the display of policy-based VLANs by choosing View->Policy Vlans in the menubar.

    Configuring VLAN memberships.

    You can drag ports between the Trunk line, Unassigned, and VLANs-by-Port. You can not manipulate Dynamic VLAN static or forbidden port membership within the application. (You must use Device Manager to do this.)

    Ports may be selected by dragging a bounding-box (marquee) around them or by clicking on a single port. The selected ports can then be dragged to their destination. They must be released within 2 pixels of their target - this can be tricky on a crowded VLAN. If a port is released over the trunk line, you must select from a list of VLANs to trunk to.

    If you move ports across Spanning Tree Groups, you will be asked to confirm that you do want to move those ports into that STG.

    Routable ports will always appear in Unassigned. They cannot be selected.

    Editing VLAN names.

    You can rename static or dynamic VLANs by clicking on their names and typing. Press the Escape key to cancel the rename operation.

    Legend.

    The Help->Legend menu displays a review of what the icons mean:

    Device View

    Occasionally it is useful to view VLANs by device; that is, which ports on a given device are members of a particular VLAN. Press the View button to toggle between the two views. You can launch Device Manager by double-clicking on the device name or by selecting File->Launch Device Manager from the menubar.

    You cannot select anything in the Device view.

    Operations

      Creating a new VLAN

      Press the Create VLAN button and enter the VLANs name. All other attributes have defaults (VLAN-by-port); these defaults can be easily overriden.

      Deleting an existing VLAN

      Select a VLAN by clicking the left mouse button on its icon , and press the Delete VLAN button.

      Renaming a VLAN

      Move the insertion cursor into the VLAN name by clicking the left mouse and start typing just as you would in an entry field. Press Return to make the make the change.

      Viewing a VLAN's attributes

      Double-click on the VLAN's icon or select and choose Edit->VLAN Attributes... from the menubar.

      Moving (static) ports from one VLAN to another

      You can select one port by clicking on its icon, or you can select multiple ports using a marquee selection (i.e., hold the left mouse button, drag, and release). Drag the selected port or ports to the destination VLAN and release. The port icon must connect to the VLAN line. If you have not released over a VLAN line or if the device rejects the VLAN change, the ports will spring back to their original location.

      Creating trunk ports

      Trunk ports are used to carry VLAN packets from one device to another. To balance the load on the device, they may trunk different subsets of the defined VLANs.

      You can create a trunked port by dragging a port from a VLAN and releasing it over the trunk line. You will be prompted for the list of trunked VLANs before the operation can continue.

      You can see which VLANs a trunk port can carry by moving your mouse over the port icon and pressing on the left mouse button. Yellow connecting lines will appear between the VLANs and the trunk line.

      Print View

      Press the Print button to print the currently displayed view.