WifiNigel

I'm documenting this for my own reference as much as anything, to avoid having to look this information up (yet again). (This description assumes that the use-case is for a guest network, but will apply to any layer-3 authenticated wireless network) It is a common occurrence on Cisco wireless networks (using a WLC of some type) to have complaints from guest users that they have to keep logging back in to the guest network after their device has gone in to sleep mode. They are often put in to sleep when they are enveloped in some type of holder or covering system that has a built-in magnet to make them sleep when they are not in use (this is very typical on iPad holders/covers). The reason for the annoying issue of having to log back in to the guest network is that the WLC has a user idle timeout setting which expires (by default) after 5 minutes. So, when a device is put in to sleep mode, the WLC will not hear from it for a while and then after  5 minutes will termi...

Overview Before the advent of WLC code version 7.0.116.0, it was difficult to scale a Cisco guest wireless solution (in terms of IP address space) due to the fact that all foreign controllers (i.e. non-guest controllers) could only map to a single layer 3 interface on the guest (anchor) controller. This often meant that a very large subnet had to be allocated to guest users to allow for multiple sites which shared a guest controller. The guest controller is usually located on a firewall DMZ interface (perhaps in a data center). The only way around this was to have multiple guest SSIDs (e.g. one per building), with a separate VLAN for each SSID. This is not a very popular option with customers as there is no consistency of SSIDs between sites/buildings. Another drawback of the single guest-VLAN restriction is that all guest traffic originates from a single subnet range. From an administrative point of view, it is often desirable for guest traffic from different buildings or sites ...