Universal Port

Universal Port is a flexible framework that enables automatic switch configuration in response to special events such as:

User login and logoff
Device connection to or disconnection from a port
Time of day
EMS event messages

Note

The Universal Port feature is supported only on the platforms listed for this feature in the license tables in the Switch Engine 32.3 Feature License Requirements document.

The primary component of the Universal Port feature is the profile, which is a special form of command script that runs when triggered by the events mentioned above.

Profiles execute commands and use variables as do the scripts described in Using CLI Scripting. The primary difference is that a profile can be executed manually or automatically in response to switch events.

Note

The term profile is distinct from the term policy because a policy is only one particular application of a profile.

Universal Port works with the following ExtremeXOS components and third-party products:

ExtremeXOS Network Login
ExtremeXOS LLDP
ExtremeXOS CLI Scripting
Status Monitoring and Statistics
RADIUS Servers
Active directory services such as LDAP and Microsoft Active Directory

The following are some examples of how you can use Universal Port on a network:

Automatically provision a VoIP phone and the attached switch port with appropriate PoE budget and QoS settings when the phone connects.
Create security policies that can follow a user as the user roams around a campus. For example, an engineer can walk from Building 1 to Building 5, plug his PC into the network and be authenticated with the appropriate access rights and ACLs.
Support separate authentication for VoIP phones and workstations on the same port.
Create profile templates with variables so that you can re-use templates with different address ranges and parameters.
Apply different security policies for different locations (for example, a restricted area).
Disable wireless access after business hours.

Note

Special scripts can be run when the switch boots. For more information, see Using Autoconfigure and Autoexecute Files.