topic Command CLI to force an AP to join another WLC in Wireless

Command CLI to force an AP to join another WLC

ELBOURAQADI.Ahmed.Ayoub — Mon, 05 Jul 2021 14:17:14 GMT

Hi,

I bet this question has been asked many times, but i couldn't find any satisfying answer.

Is there a CLI command to force an AP to join another WLC without the need of rebooting it.

My enterprise uses two 5508 WLC.

Thanks in advance for your answers

Re: Command CLI to force an AP to join another WLC

Darren Roback — Tue, 04 Jul 2017 15:48:30 GMT

I'm only aware of the command "capwap ap controller ip address ip_address" to instruct a lighweight AP to join a particular controller should the discovery process fail or not return a list of controllers. Note though that once the AP attempts to join the controller, it may reboot if either the software load is different or during the process of applying the configuration provided by the controller.

Thanks,
Darren

Re: Command CLI to force an AP to join another WLC

ELBOURAQADI.Ahmed.Ayoub — Tue, 04 Jul 2017 16:11:59 GMT

Thanks Darren. But I guess my question wasn't clear enough.

I need to migrate all the APs associated with one WLC (seondary) to another one (primary). Even if the primary controller parameters are set in the high availibility controller tab, the APs stay associated to the secondary one. And i need to do this operation through CLI

Re: Command CLI to force an AP to join another WLC

Darren Roback — Tue, 04 Jul 2017 17:15:50 GMT

Have you configured AP Fallback (Controller -> General -> AP Fallback) on all controllers in your environment? This will ensure that when the primary controller comes back online that APs will automatically fail-back to it.

Re: Command CLI to force an AP to join another WLC

ELBOURAQADI.Ahmed.Ayoub — Tue, 04 Jul 2017 18:48:14 GMT

I confirm. AP Fallback is enabled on both WLCs.

Re: Command CLI to force an AP to join another WLC

PATRICK HILLYER — Wed, 05 Jul 2017 16:47:15 GMT

If you have the same image on both controllers, you should be able to manipulate where they connect by changing the primary controller settings...

config ap primary-base Controller_name AP_name Controller_IP

If you make this change it will overwrite the existing Primary Controller configured on the AP (please be aware), but should allow for the "graceful" migration you requested. (if the priority is already set, which it appears to be from your post, you may need the additional step below)

If the AP does not migrate, you could try changing the "priority" of the AP, which would force a lower priority AP off the controller (and presumably onto the other controller)...

config ap priority 4 AP_name

For this to work, the existing APs would have to be at a lower priority. If they are not, you can use a similar command for the APs you want to move off the primary but using a number lower than 4. I've had success with this method on a number of release versions in the past when needing to juggle APs on 5508 controllers without rebooting them. Hope this works for you.

These commands are one AP at a time so you will have to build a list of APs. The quickest I've found is to make sure your screen is set wide enough for the show ap summary output with one AP per line and issue these commands...

config paging disable

show ap summary

Then grab the session output and use a text editor with block mode editing (like Notepad++) to strip the unnecessary columns and insert the commands in front of the column of AP names. The process to build the commands for 500 APs can literally be done in minutes (<2).

Re: Command CLI to force an AP to join another WLC

ELBOURAQADI.Ahmed.Ayoub — Fri, 07 Jul 2017 08:03:15 GMT

Hi Patrick,

Thank you for your quick answer. I used those commands but unfortunatly, it didn't work. The AP stays sticked to the secondary controller. I also tried to use GUI : i set only the primary controller's parameter on the high availability tab for one AP, i put its failover priority to "High" , but the result stays the same.

The software version used on our WLCs is 8.0.121.0.

Re: Command CLI to force an AP to join another WLC

ELBOURAQADI.Ahmed.Ayoub — Mon, 24 Jul 2017 14:16:52 GMT

Hi,

There was a licence issue. That's what explain why the APs wouldn't associate to the primary controller.

After having resolved that licence issue, the rest was done on its own.

Many thanks again for your help.

Re: Command CLI to force an AP to join another WLC

DuJin0509 — Fri, 03 Aug 2018 03:00:05 GMT

Hello Elbouraqadi,
would you please elaborate what is the license issue did you have and how did you get the issue resolved for the same as we have analogous issue happening.
I am looking forward to hearing from you.
THanks in advance.

Re: Command CLI to force an AP to join another WLC

DuJin0509 — Fri, 03 Aug 2018 03:02:42 GMT

hello dear,

Would you please elaborate what's the exact license issue you mentioned and how did you get the issue resolved as I encounter the same.

Thanks in advance.

Re: Command CLI to force an AP to join another WLC

patoberli — Mon, 06 Aug 2018 09:47:35 GMT

He probably was out of AP licenses on the primary WLC and needed to buy more.

Re: Command CLI to force an AP to join another WLC

msamighersheen — Mon, 25 Apr 2022 09:52:41 GMT

capwap ap controller ip address ip_address

(Cisco Controller) >capwap ap ?
(Cisco Controller) >capwap ap

no such commands

Re: Command CLI to force an AP to join another WLC

JPavonM — Mon, 25 Apr 2022 10:55:15 GMT

That "capwap ap" command is on AP CLI.

For WLC CLI try these:

config ap primary-base <wlc_name> <APName> <wlc_ip>
config ap secondary-base <wlc_name> <APName> <wlc_ip>

HTH
-Jesus
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Re: Command CLI to force an AP to join another WLC

msamighersheen — Mon, 25 Apr 2022 19:36:08 GMT

After auth-list add mic

The app is showing in ap join stats summary list but is not getting joined

As the AP primary controller is same one

Ap also broadcasting Disable Bssid

Re: Command CLI to force an AP to join another WLC

msamighersheen — Wed, 27 Apr 2022 19:02:08 GMT

thank you

the issue was resolved

as someone enabled the aaa auth and the AP cant join