At work we’re undergoing a major network transformation, migrating from Cisco to Aruba CX platform. While the technical aspects are really exciting, one thing surprised me: Bluetooth setup!
While unboxing a brand new 6300CX, I saw this USB dongle attached to a peace of paper with the explanation that you can do the (initial) configuration trough Aruba CX app on your phone. So I decided to give it a try and see how this work and I truth to be told, I was impressed! It was so easy to stack them and do the initial configs. (For the ones who are not really into networking, Stacking is connecting a set of switches that are connected through specific ports and will make them act as one switch.)
Aruba CX Mobile App
The steps to stack and configure the switches are extremely easy and all you need is, from to have the obvious Aruba CX devices, the USB dongle and your phone with Aruba CX app on it & Bluetooth enabled.
Simply search for the Aruba devices and they’ll appear with switch_model&Serialnumber in the Bluetooth list where you can pair it with your phone. Once you connect with one, you can stack the other device using the same method.
After this you can simply login using the standard admin credentials (admin and no password) and create a new password for the admin account and you can start the initial switch configuration. In the app you have the choice of using a template from a list of templates provided by the application. Or you can import it Aruba NetEdit. Since at work we have a specific configuration to be deployed I went for the Modify Config and started to do the initial configuration on my phone.
Conclusion
While using the USB dongle is very convenient and easy to use, and since I had connected the mgmt port to my existing switch, the new stack was available on the network, so I switched to my laptop to complete the rest of the config. Don’t get me wrong, you could do entire config from the app but I simply choose my 24″ screen, physical keyboard and mouse to complete the configuration.
Off course this method can also be used for troubleshooting session as well, so no don’t longer need to have your console cable with you. This makes things much easier and convenient to use!
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