README v3.20.8 2025-03-19
Table of contents
1. General
This document describes the cisco-apicdc NED.
Additional README files bundled with this NED package
Common NED Features
Verified target systems
1.1 Extract the NED package
It is assumed the NED package ncs-<NSO version>-cisco-apicdc-<NED version>.signed.bin has already
been downloaded from software.cisco.com.
In this instruction the following example settings will be used:
NSO version: 6.0
NED version: 1.0.1
NED package downloaded to: /tmp/ned-package-store
Extract the NED package and verify its signature:
In case the signature can not be verified (for instance if no internet connection), do as below instead:
The result of the extraction shall be a tar.gz file with the same name as the .bin file:
1.2 Install the NED package
There are two alternative ways to install this NED package. Which one to use depends on how NSO itself is setup.
In the instructions below the following example settings will be used:
NSO version: 6.0
NED version: 1.0.1
NED download directory: /tmp/ned-package-store
NSO run time directory: ~/nso-lab-rundir
A prerequisite is to set the environment variable NSO_RUNDIR to point at the NSO run time directory:
1.2.1 Local install
This section describes how to install a NED package on a locally installed NSO (see "NSO Local Install" in the NSO Installation guide).
It is assumed the NED package has been been unpacked to a tar.gz file as described in 1.1.
Untar the tar.gz file. This creates a new sub-directory named:
cisco-apicdc-<NED major digit>.<NED minor digit>:Install the NED into NSO, using the ncs-setup tool:
Open a NSO CLI session and load the new NED package like below:
Alternatively the tar.gz file can be installed directly into NSO. Then skip steps 1 and 2 and do like below instead:
1.2.2 System install
This section describes how to install a NED package on a system installed NSO (see "NSO System Install" in the NSO Installation Guide).
It is assumed the NED package has been been unpacked to a tar.gz file as described in 1.1.
Do a NSO backup before installing the new NED package:
Start a NSO CLI session and fetch the NED package:
Install the NED package (add the argument replace-existing if a previous version has been loaded):
Load the NED package
1.3 Configure the NED in NSO
This section describes the steps for configuring a device instance using the newly installed NED package.
Start a NSO CLI session:
Enter configuration mode:
Configure a new authentication group (my-group) to be used for this device:
Configure a new device instance (example: dev-1):
Configure the way the NED wil get the configuration when performing a sync-from.
When executing sync-from the NED supports multiple ways of getting the configuration file. Using the following ned-settings, the NED can get the config file using ftp or sftp protocols, localhost or a intermediate host. It also can do a sync-from a static (handled by the user) file without triggering a config export from APIC device.
The process of getting the configuration from the APIC device to the NSO:
The NED triggers a configuration export on the APIC device.
The APIC device uses the protocol configured in “ned-settings cisco-apicdc protocol sftp” To connect to the host configured in “ned-settings cisco-apicdc host on the port configured in “ned-settings cisco-apicdc port”.
Then uses the username “ned-settings cisco-apicdc user-name” and password “ned-settings cisco-apicdc user-password” to authenticate on that host.
After successfully connected it will download the configuration archive in the path “ned-settings cisco-apicdc config-path”
If the “ned-settings cisco-apicdc local-host true” the NED will assume that the device is downloading the configuration archive on the host the NSO is running and using the path “ned-settings cisco-apicdc config-path” will look for the configuration file.
If the “ned-settings cisco-apicdc local-host false” the NED will use the protocol host port user-name user-password to retrieve the configuration archive from a remote host.
The NED will look for the exported configuration archive and if found, it will load it in the configuration database.
At the end the configuration archive is deleted by the NED.
Optionally set the ssl to accept-any
Optionally specify a list of objects that are controlled by the NED.
The list is used to limit the amount of configuration data exported from APIC. Only the dn:s in the list will be considered by the check-sync and sync-from functions. This allows to have APIC configuration to be split into NSO controlled and not NSO controlled items. If the list is empty, the complete APIC config will be used in check-sync and sync-from.
Items in the list shall be in dn format:
Example: [uni/tn-aTenant uni/infra uni/l3dom-aL3Domain ].
The objects in the list must be direct under uni. Objects further down in the tree cannot be specified in this list.
Optionally enable cluster alternative-hosts.
The NED has the ability to connect to alternative devices in the APIC cluster if the main APIC is down.
If the connection fails to the main APIC the NED will try one by one the hosts in the alternative-hosts list.
Optionally enable cluster health checking before commit.
APIC has a "health" field, to indicate its health state (if APIC is available to accept the configuration changes/updates) If the field shows "fully-fit", that means the APIC is available to use for normal operation. If the field shows any other state, that means we can't use the primary APIC.
When the "health" field shows other state than "fully-fit" the NED needs to inspect another alternative host (if configured) and check it is available to use.
When the "commit-fully-fit-only" field is set to true an extra device status read will be performed after login, and if the "health" field is not set to "fully-fit" then the device will be rejected, and the ned will try the next device from the "alternative-hosts" list. The following filed enables the extra health check:
Optionally disable-check-sync.
When set to true, check-sync function will be disabled and commits will be accepted even if the NED is out of sync with the device. Used to speed up the commit procedure when the check sync feature is not mandatory.
Finally commit the configuration
Verify configuration, using a sync-from.
If the sync-from was not successful, check the NED configuration again.
2. Optional debug and trace setup
It is often desirable to see details from when and how the NED interacts with the device(Example: troubleshooting)
This can be achieved by configuring NSO to generate a trace file for the NED. A trace file contains information about all interactions with the device. Messages sent and received as well as debug printouts, depending on the log level configured.
NSO creates one separate trace file for each device instance with tracing enabled. Stored in the following location:
$NSO_RUNDIR/logs/ned-cisco-apicdc-gen-1.0-<device name>.trace
Do as follows to enable tracing in one specific device instance in NSO:
Start a NSO CLI session:
Enter configuration mode:
Enable trace raw:
Alternatively, tracing can be enabled globally affecting all configured device instances:
Configure the log level for printouts to the trace file:
Alternatively the log level can be set globally affecting all configured device instances using this NED package.
The log level 'info' is used by default and the 'debug' level is the most verbose.
IMPORTANT: Tracing shall be used with caution. This feature does increase the number of IPC messages sent between the NED and NSO. In some cases this can affect the performance in NSO. Hence, tracing should normally be disabled in production systems.
An alternative method for generating printouts from the NED is to enable the Java logging mechanism. This makes the NED print log messages to common NSO Java log file.
$NSO_RUNDIR/logs/ncs-java-vm.log
Do as follows to enable Java logging in the NED
Start a NSO CLI session:
Enter configuration mode:
Enable Java logging with level all from the NED package:
Configure the NED to log to the Java logger
Alternatively Java logging can be enabled globally affecting all configured device instances using this NED package.
IMPORTANT: Java logging does not use any IPC messages sent to NSO. Consequently, NSO performance is not affected. However, all log printouts from all log enabled devices are saved in one single file. This means that the usability is limited. Typically single device use cases etc.
3. Dependencies
This NED has the following host environment dependencies:
Java 1.8 (NSO version < 6.2)
Java 17 (NSO version >= 6.2)
Gnu Sed
Dependencies for NED recompile:
Apache Ant
Bash
Gnu Sort
Gnu awk
Grep
Python3 (with packages: re, sys, getopt, subprocess, argparse, os, glob)
4. Sample device configuration
4.1 Config example
5. Built in live-status actions
This sections describes the RPCs (remote procedure cals) provided by the NED:
5.1 lldp-api
REST call:
method: GET
URI: /api/node/class/topology/pod-1/node-101/lldpIf.json? rsp-subtree=children&rsp-subtree-class=lldpIf,lldpAdjEp&rsp-subtree-include=required&subscription=yes&order-by=lldpIf.name
5.2 disable-interface
REST call:
method: POST
URI: /api/node/mo/uni/fabric/outofsvc.xml
body: <fabricRsOosPath tDn=topology/pod-<podId>/paths-<leafId>/pathep-[] lc=blacklist/>
5.3 delete-tech-support-status
REST call:
method: POST
URI: /api/node/mo/expcont/expstatus-<polName>/inst-<collectionTime>/tsnode-<nodeId>.json
body: {"dbgexpTechSupStatus":{"attributes":{"dn":"expcont/expstatus-tsod-3811/inst-2018-09-21T13:50:58.846-08:00/tsnode-3811","status":"deleted"},"children":[]}}
5.4 device-rest-call
REST call: Generic REST call that depends on the provided parameters
5.5 enable-interface
REST call:
method: POST
URI: /api/node/mo/uni/fabric/outofsvc.xml
body: <fabricRsOosPath dn="uni/fabric/outofsvc/rsoosPath-[topology/pod-/paths-<leafId>/pathep-[<portId>]]" status="deleted"/>
5.6 delete-remote-location
REST call:
method: POST
URI: /api/node/mo/uni/fabric/path-<name>
body: <fileRemotePath dn="uni/fabric/path-<name>" status="deleted"/>
5.7 delete-export-policy
REST call:
method: POST
URI: /api/node/mo/uni/fabric/configexp-
body: <configExportP dn="uni/fabric/configexp-<name>" status="deleted"/>
5.8 post-fabricRsOosPath
REST call:
method: POST
URI: /api/node/mo/uni/fabric/outofsvc.xml
body: <fabricRsOosPath dn=<dn> tDn=<tDn> lc=<lc> status=<status>/>
5.9 show-run
Gets the running config in xml format either for all config or for speciffic DN
5.10 exportcryptkey-set
Set Encryption Passphrase and Keys for Config Export(and Import).
REST call:
method: POST
URI: /api/node/mo/uni/.xml
body: <pkiExportEncryptionKey> ... </pkiExportEncryptionKey>
5.11 exportcryptkey-status
Get the status Encryption Passphrase and Keys for Config Export(and Import)
REST call:
method: GET
URI: /api/node/mo/uni/exportcryptkey.xml
5.12 query-dhcp-client
REST call:
method: GET
URI: /api/node/class/dhcpClient.xml?query-target-filter=<query-target-filter>
5.13 check-leaf-existence
REST call:
method: GET
URI: /api/node/mo/topology/pod-<pod>/node-<node>.xml
5.14 check-operation-state
REST call:
method: GET
URI: /api/node/mo/topology/pod-<id>/node-<id>.xml?query-target=subtree&target-subtree-class=infraWiNode
5.15 check-epg-config
REST call:
method: GET
URI: /api/node/mo/topology/pod-<pod>/node-<node>/sys/phys-[phys].xml?rsp-subtree-include=full-deployment&target-node=all&target-path=l1EthIfToEPg
5.16 change-apic-adminState
REST call:
method: POST
URI: /api/node/mo/topology/pod-<podId>/node-<nodeId>/av.xml
body: <fabricNode dn="topology/pod-<podId>/node-<podId>" adSt=<adSt>/>
5.17 change-apic-service-state
REST call:
method: POST
URI: /api/node/mo/topology/pod-<podId>/node-<nodeId>/av.xml
body: <infraWiNode dn="topology/pod-<podId>/node-<nodeId1>/av/<nodeId2>" adminSt=<adminSt>/>
5.18 switch-decommission
REST call:
method: POST
URI: /api/node/mo/uni/fabric/outofsvc.xml
body: <fabricRsDecommissionNode tDn="topology/pod-<podId>/node-<nodeId>" removeFromController="true"/>
5.19 switch-register
REST call:
method: POST
URI: /api/node/mo/uni/controller/nodeidentpol.xml
body: <fabricNodeIdentP dn="uni/controller/nodeidentpol/nodep-<nodeId>" serial=<serial> nodeId=<nodeId> name=<name> status="created,modified"/>
5.20 switch-commission
REST call:
method: POST
URI: /api/node/mo/uni/fabric/outofsvc.xml
body: <fabricRsDecommissionNode tDn="topology/pod-<podId>/node-<nodeId>" status="deleted"/>
5.21 switch-commission
REST call:
method: POST
URI: /api/node/mo/uni/fabric/outofsvc.xml
body: <fabricRsDecommissionNode tDn="topology/pod-/node-" status="deleted"/>
5.21 download_apic_image
REST call:
method: POST
URI: /api/node/mo/uni/fabric/fwrepop/osrc-<name>
body: {"firmwareOSource":{"attributes":{"dn":"uni/fabric/fwrepop/osrc-<name>", name":<name>,"url":<imagePath> "proto":"http","status":"created,modified","rn":"osrc-<name>"},"children":[]}}
5.22 status_download_apic_image
REST call:
method: GET
URI: /api/node/mo/topology/pod-<pod>/node-<node>/sys/phys-[phys].xml?rsp-subtree-include=full-deployment&target-node=all&target-path=l1EthIfToEPg
5.22 trigger_apic_update
REST call:
method: POST
URI: /api/node/mo/uni/controller.json
body: {"ctrlrInst":{"attributes":{"dn":"uni/controller", "status":"modified"},"children":[{"firmwareCtrlrFwP":{"attributes":{"dn":"uni/controller/ctrlrfwpol" ,"ignoreCompat":"false","version":"%s","name":"%s"},"children":[]}}, {"maintCtrlrMaintP":{"attributes":{"dn":"uni/controller/ctrlrmaintpol","adminSt":"triggered"}, "children":[]}},{"trigSchedP":{"attributes":{"dn":"uni/controller/schedp-%s","status":"modified"}, "children":[{"trigAbsWindowP":{"attributes":{"dn":"uni/controller/schedp-%s/abswinp-%s" ,"date":"%s"},"children":[]}}]}}]}}
5.23 status_update
REST call:
method: GET
URI: /api/node/class/maintUpgJob.json?"query-target-filter=and(eq(maintUpgJob.fwPolName,"all"))&order-by=maintUpgJob.modTs|desc"
5.24 trigger_leaf_update
REST call:
method: POST
URI: /api/node/mo/uni/fabric.json
body: {"fabricInst":{ ... "children":[{"maintMaintGrp":{ ... "children":[{"fabricNodeBlk":{
5.25 get_pods
REST call:
method: GET
URI: /api/node/class/fabricPod.json
5.26 get_pod_nodes
REST call:
method: GET
URI: api/node/mo/topology/pod-<pod>?query-target=children&target-subtree-class=fabricNode&query-target-filter=and(eq(fabricNode.role,"<type-filter>"))
5.27 get_pod_node_interfaces
REST call:
method: GET
URI: /api/node/mo/topology/pod-/node-/l1PhysIf.json
5.28 get_bgpPeerEntrys
REST call:
method: GET
URI: api/node/mo/topology/pod-<pod>/node-<node>/sys/bgp/inst/dom-<dom>.json? query-target=subtree&target-subtree-class=bgpPeerEntry&subscription=<subscription>
5.29 get_bgpPeers
REST call:
method: GET
URI: /api/node/class/bgpPeer.json
6. Built in live-status show
NONE
7. Limitations
7.1 /apic/pkiExportEncryptionKey container not present at sync-from
It seems that the APIC device version 6.0 does not export pkiExportEncryptionKey in the exported configuration. This will manifest itself in the fact that this configuration will not ne present whne executing a sync-from. To verify this issue the user can execute "devices device cisco-apicdc-0 live-status cisco-apicdcstats:exec show-run" and look for the pkiExportEncryptionKey object.
As for the configuration part it seems that the APIC device does accept the configuration that come from the NED side regarding pkiExportEncryptionKey object.
8. How to report NED issues and feature requests
Issues like bugs and errors shall always be reported to the Cisco NSO NED team through the Cisco Support channel:
The following information is required for the Cisco NSO NED team to be able to investigate an issue:
Do as follows to gather the necessary information needed for your device, here named 'dev-1':
Enable full debug logging in the NED
Configure the NSO to generate a raw trace file from the NED
If the NED already had trace enabled, clear it in order to submit only relevant information
Do as follows for NSO 6.4 or newer:
Do as follows for older NSO versions:
Run a compare-config to populate the trace with initial device config
Reproduce the found issue using ncs_cli or your NSO service. Write down each necessary step in a reproduction report.
Gather the reproduction report and a copy of the raw trace file containing data recorded when the issue happened.
Contact the Cisco support and request to open a case. Provide the gathered files together with access details for a device that can be used by the Cisco NSO NED when investigating the issue.
Requests for new features and extensions of the NED are handled by the Cisco NSO NED team when applicable. Such requests shall also go through the Cisco support channel.
The following information is required for feature requests and extensions:
A detailed use case description, with details like:
Data of interest
The kind of operations to be used on the data. Like: 'read', 'create', 'update', 'delete' and the order of the operation
Device APIs involved in the operations (For example: REST URLs and payloads)
Device documentation describing the operations involved
Run sync-from # devices device dev-1 sync-from (if relevant)
Attach the raw trace to the ticket (if relevant)
Access to a device that can be used by the Cisco NSO NED team for testing and verification of the new feature. This usually means that both read and write permissions are required. Pseudo access via tools like Webex, Zoom etc is not acceptable. However, it is ok with access through VPNs, jump servers etc.
9. Ned read timeout policy
From v3.0.24 the NED adopts a custom timeout policy. When getting the configuration from the CISCO APIC device several steps are executed:
An configuration export is triggered.
The configuration file is copied by APIC on local host or a remote host.
The configuration file is read and the config is loaded in NSO configuration database.
There are two timeout values that can be modified:
devices device read-timeout
Guards the time interval between step 1. and the first time the config file appears on the host.
devices device ned-settings cisco-apicdc cfgDownloadTimeout
Guards the time in which the config file is downloaded on the host.
10. APIC cluster health handling
APIC has a field, "health" field, to indicate its health state if APIC is available to accept the configuration changes/updates. If the field shows "fully-fit", that means the APIC is available to use for normal operation. If the field shows any other state, that means we can't use the primary APIC.
When the "health" field shows other state than "fully-fit" the NED needs to inspect another alternative host (if configured in ned-settings cisco-apicdc alternative-hosts).
The following filed enables the extra health check:
When the "commit-fully-fit-only" field is set to "TRUE" an extra device status read will be performed after login, and if the "healt" field is not set to "fully-fit" then the device will be rejected, and the ned will try the devices from the "alternative-hosts" list.
Last updated
Was this helpful?