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Client Roaming Within Single WLC with Different AP Groups

spsnnetwork
Level 1
Level 1

I am trying to setup a 4400 WLC with 2 different AP Groups mapped to its respective Dynamic Interfaces / Vlans. AP's are equally mapped to both the AP groups by Floor wise ex: First floor AP's connect to one AP group and the Second Floor AP's connecting to other AP group.

Goal is to create separate Network policy for each Floor using ACL's and apply to their respective Vlans on Layer 3 Switch. Wireless Raoming should happen seamlessly between these Ap groups making the DHCP changes by not disconnecting and connecting every time user roam across the Floors.

Problem is When Clients Roam between Floors i,e moving between AP Groups, they still maintain their old DHCP IP addresses when moved to new AP group even after Client re-authetication. This defies our goal of creating a Wireless Network Policy using single WLC.

Knobs i have tuned in WLC to acheive our goal includes....

1. WLAN Session Timeout - No use

2. DHCP Proxy Disable - No Use

3. ARP Time out - No use

Looks like WLC is storing the IP address and MAC information of the Client unconditonally during roaming and clearing out untill a manual or forced disconnect or disassociation is done.

Did anyone tried to implement this setup and made it running? Any help or suggestion would be higly appreciated.

Thanks

Guru

10 Replies 10

Stephen Rodriguez
Cisco Employee
Cisco Employee

Guru,

     This is the correct action for the WLC. 

When a client roams across the AP groups, it does a Layer 3 roam.  With a Layer 3 roam, the client maintains there address, and sessions that were previously established.

If user A comes up on group First Floor, they will have that IP and policy.

If user B comes up on Group Second Floor, they will have that IP and policy.

This is then carreid through out the entire time the client is connected to the WLC.

HTH,

Steve

HTH,
Steve

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Hi Stephen

Thanks for the reply.

I have understood by reading through the Cisco UWC design document that this is the default design behaviour. Is there anyway we can tweak the single WLC to acheive the above scenario.

I believe my design goal can be acheived by adding another WLC with different Mobility Group with same SSID across Floors, but wanted to know if it can be done using single Controller by changing settings somewhere in the controller especially when AP group is added exclusivley for the Interface Seggregation purpose.

Thanks in advance.

Guru

Guru,

     If you go with a second WLC in a different mobility group, the client would do a full authentication and re-DHCP to get the correct IP address.  More than likely, this would not be seemless, hence would be against your goals.

does the client absolutely have to get a new IP address when it roams floors?

HTH,
Steve

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Hi Stephen

Yes client has to get the new Ip address when it roams from one floor to other to comply with the new Floor network policy seemlessly.

What about a different authentication method and SSID per floor, with both profiles defined on the devices?

Sent from Cisco Technical Support iPad App

Scott Fella
Hall of Fame
Hall of Fame

Not really what people want to do. People want smooth roaming no matter what. The only way you can get that to work is to have another WLC. So you would have WLC 1 handle the odd floors and WLC 2 handle the even floors. You will not have mobility setup between the two.

This will cause you more issues since the devices will not try to request a dhcp and it doesn't prevent you from accessing an ap I'm an adjacent floor.

This is not a suggested way as it will make your wireless useless.

Sent from Cisco Technical Support iPhone App

-Scott
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Scott Fella
Hall of Fame
Hall of Fame

Wow this was an old post. I replied to the initial one.

Dhcp required means the device will not get on the wireless if they have a static address.

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-Scott
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Hi Scott,

Agree'd on the Dhcp required means the device will not get on the wireless if they have a static address.

If you roam from AP group 1 to AP group 2 and had to re-associate then would you receive an IP address from AP Group 2 since the client was erased from the WLC MSCB table?

Not if there is mobility. The WLC will keep your information. It's called layer 3 roaming.

Sent from Cisco Technical Support iPhone App

-Scott
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