Cisco ACI Configuration Transfer

[apfeil]

I am going to be bringing a new data center online next week. We have a cookie cutter data center solution so that most of the configuration stays the same between data centers. One example is that there are three APICs, 2 spines, and however many leafs where only the naming convention and IP addresses really change. My question. What would be the preferred or fastest method to copy out data from the existing data center, modify the configuration, and configure the new data center. I previously placed a ticket with Cisco TAC and they said that I cannot export the configuration, unzip it, modify it, and then import it. I have also read that you do not want to do some configuration in the CLI and some in the GUI. I cannot believe that the fastest way to do it would be to manually configure the new ACI infrastructure using the GUI. Has anybody done something similar, did you use Terraform, or REST API? 

Any ideas are greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Alex

[apfeil · Accepted solution]

I found one way to use mo.xml and post the xml in a post. JSON seemed to work as well. The snapshot exports a configuration in XML and I was able to import tenant configurations so far. I tested that in the devnet sandbox. I also believe it would make sense to have the exact same code between the two data centers.

[ecsnnsls]

You can extract the entire config using the apic command "showconfig" and then modify the parameter values that is unique for your second DC. Once that is done, you can post the config to the second DC.

[Sergiu.Daniluk]

I would not recommend using this method if you plan on doing later configs in ACI via GUI. It's strongly advised to avoid mixing CLI config and GUI config.

Take care,

Sergiu

[ecsnnsls]

Any specific reason? From my understanding, the output only gives the user the list of the configured parameters.

So the user can remove the unnecessary configs and post the ones that is required assuming both the APICs are of the same version. What's the catch here?

[Sergiu.Daniluk]

Changes made through the APIC Basic GUI can be seen, but cannot be modified in the Advanced GUI, and changes made in the Advanced GUI cannot be rendered in the Basic GUI. The Basic GUI is kept synchronized with the NX-OS style CLI, so that if you make a change from the NX-OS style CLI, these changes are rendered in the Basic GUI, and changes made in the Basic GUI are rendered in the NX-OS style CLI, but the same synchronization does not occur between the Advanced GUI and the NX-OS style CLI. See the following examples:

• Do not mix the Advanced GUI and the CLI, when doing per-interface configuration on APIC. Configurations performed in the GUI, may only partially work in the NX-OS CLI.

https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/td/docs/switches/datacenter/aci/apic/sw/4-x/troubleshooting/Cisco-APIC-Troubleshooting-Guide-411/Cisco-APIC-Troubleshooting-Guide-411_chapter_010011.html

FYI: advanced GUI is the normal APIC GUI you see and use.

Take care,

Sergiu

[ecsnnsls · Accepted solution]

Thank you for your response.

I have the following questions,

1. The output of the showconfig is an XML output. Are you saying that modifying this as per user needs and POSTing the modified XML through REST API will cause inconsistency in the configs?
2. If Advanced GUI is the normal APIC GUI, what is basic GUI?

Cheers

[Sergiu.Daniluk]

1. Ah.. my mistake. I thought you refer to "show running-config" and copy pasting the cfg in the CLI of new APIC. I didn't new about this command "showconfig". I just tried it and, as you said, it's the config in XML format. I guess in this case, should be all good. Modifing it and posting it through API should be fine. In the end, the config made through GUI is still using REST API.

2. Forget about Basic GUI, it's something deprecated in version 3.1. It's used as historical name.

Take care,

Sergiu

[ecsnnsls]

No worries, I should have been clearer about the XML part in my earlier comment.

Thanks for clearing it up.

Cheers.