How Extreme Fabric helped an Extreme Partner automate deployment of next generation K-12 network 4x faster

Extreme Partner leveraged Extreme Fabric Connect and the implicit automation capabilities of Fabric Connect to deploy a K-12 network consisting of 242 switches across 23 locations in less than a week. This was four times (4x) faster than what it took for their previous deployment (with Fabric Switching Competitor). Recent innovations in Extreme Fabric (including port auto-sense capability) allowed Extreme Partner to easily replace their previous network with an end-to-end Extreme Fabric with minimal effort - including no staging and no manual configuration.

Using Extreme, enterprises can choose to deploy a traditional Layer2/Layer 3 network design with stacking. Alternatively, they can deploy Fabric Connect from Campus Distribution/Core to the Campus Edge for a highly automated rollout to deliver capital and operational cost savings. In addition, Fabric Connect provides hyper-segmentation for separating various networks (such as IoT end devices, video surveillance cameras, users and servers) into distinct secure groups for compliance. Unlike other Fabric solutions, you can also extend the Fabric (via Fabric Attach) to Wireless Access Points for consistent user/device policies.

The school district had previously deployed a Fabric Switch Competitor distribution/core/edge network that spanned 23 locations with 30 core switches and 212 edge switches. When it was time for refresh, they evaluated Extreme's Fabric Connect solution and found it to be the clear winner because of its simplicity of deployment and operations while also meeting their compliance needs through the hyper-segmentation capabilities.

Extreme Partner says "This is unheard of speed for us. The ability to simply physically unbox gear and load them in vehicles without having to first identify, asset tag, group, preconfigure, and keep in a particular physical order all the way until install, GREATLY increased our deployment rate." Not only did they not need deep expertise in networking but they didn't even need to configure uplinks or downlinks for Fabric. Most importantly, the Extreme Partner said "Once global voice and data VLANs are configured on the switch, auto-sense allowed ports to be automatically configured based on the device (type) connected to the port. For computer lab switches (with 2 uplinks), they didn't have to designate uplink ports or have special configuration. Fabric Connect ensured no network loops occur with 2 uplinks."

The school district's requirements for the solution were the following:

• Easy to deploy (no deep technical expertise required)
• Easy to operate (adds/moves/changes should be easy, minimizing change windows)
• Allow segmentation of their network into distinct secure groups for compliance (IoT devices, Video Surveillance Cameras, Users, Servers, Printers etc.)
• Add new network services (such as an IoT network) without requiring changes to distribution/core switches
• Scale across small to large networks

Typically deploying a large number of edge switches is very time consuming. Labeling ports for different types of devices (such as IoT devices, Wireless Access Points, video surveillance cameras, users, servers and printers) requires manual configuration of switch ports and doesn't facilitate adds/moves/changes. Also, for customers that don't have a policy server to enforce user/device access policies (such as 802.1x, MAC authentication), it's important the solution not mandate a policy server.

Fabric Connect cuts down deployment time while also protecting the network against security threats (such as rogue switches in the network). The Fabric Connect solution recently introduced Port Auto-Sense capability which detects when a device is plugged into a port and automatically configures that port. Device type-based port configuration can be defined and managed from ExtremeCloud IQ Site-Engine (centralized On-Premises solution for managing both Extreme devices & 3rd party devices). Edge Switch Global Settings (such as Voice VLAN, data VLAN, Wireless Access Point VLANs, Camera VLAN etc.) can be applied to Edge switches using ExtremeCloud IQ-Site Engine (or using CLI/Scripts). When the end device is disconnected from the network, port configuration reverts back to a default state (which facilitates adds/moves/changes).

With Port Auto-Sense capability:

• Fabric links get established automatically
• Extreme Wireless Access Points are detected & SSID-VLAN bindings are shared with network.
• When an end-user device is connected to an Auto-Sense port, the device gets assigned to a predefined network segment (if authentication is not enabled). If authentication is enabled on Auto-Sense Port, switch authenticates the user and provides the correct binding to a predefined subnet based on Policy Server (such as Extreme Control)

Fabric Connect provides the flexibility to map L2 VLANs or L3 VRFs to a unique Fabric Service ID (Fabric ISID) at the Edge. Adding a new service doesn't require changes to distribution/core switches. If Edge switch is deployed in L2 mode, each VLAN can be mapped to a unique Fabric Service ID. If the Edge switch is a L3 router, each VRF can be mapped to a unique Fabric Service ID.

K-12 Network Refresh

When it was time for refresh, three technicians managed the physical installation of switches (i.e. unboxing, racking and cabling) while the Extreme Partner network engineer collaborated with school district network engineer for this deployment.

Topology was as follows:

Using the new Port Auto-Sense capabilities, the installation went from unboxing switches on Monday morning to a fully refreshed edge and core by Friday night without requiring any pre-configuration. The port auto-sense capability was the main factor contributing to the 4x accelerated network install.

In summary, Extreme Partner leveraged Extreme's Fabric Connect technology to replace a K-12 network with Fabric Switch Competitor distribution/core/access with end-to-end Extreme . With Auto-sense capability, Edge switches automatically configured ports based on devices plugged into switch ports eliminating the need for manual configuration while Fabric Connect provides hyper segmentation for separating various devices into distinct secure groups for compliance.

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