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Create External Generic System

When you want to connect your Apstra-managed fabric to a system that's not managed in the Apstra environment, you use generic systems and external generic systems. These systems can be external routers, firewalls, or whatever else you want; you specify their roles with tags. If the system is part of a rack topology, we call it a generic system (or internal generic system). If the system is not part of a rack topology, we call it an external generic system.

  1. From the blueprint, navigate to Staged > Physical > Topology and select the leaf, spine or superspine to connect to the new external generic system.
    The Topology view of the selection appears.
  2. Select the node check box to see the operations available for that node (and that you have permissions for), then click Add internal/external generic system.
    Note:

    You can also get to the selection page from the Nodes view. From the blueprint, navigate to Staged > Physical > Nodes, click the node name in the table, then click the node name that appears at the top of the Selection panel (on the right side of the page).
    The Create New System dialog opens.
  3. For Generic Type, select External.
  4. Enter a unique name. The optional Hostname automatically populates with the same name.
  5. Select the representation for the new node (none, logical device, or logical device with interface map), then select the appropriate logical device or interface map from the drop-down list, as applicable. (Logical devices allow you to define port roles.)
  6. Enter the port channel ID min and max. The values in the range are used to allocate PC IDs for all leafs, spines, and superspines attached to this external generic system. If you leave the values at zero, any available port-channel may be used.
  7. Enter tags (optional) to identify the role(s) of the new external generic system.
  8. Click Next.
    The Create Links dialog opens
  9. Select an available port and transformation. The gray Add Link button turns green. Click Add Link.
    The link is added to the link table.
  10. The operation mode (new in Apstra version 5.0.0) for new links defaults to Up. You have the option of setting it to Down, from the drop-down list.
  11. You have the option of creating a LAG when you create a generic system (new in Apstra version 5.0.0). Click the Create lag check box, then select the LAG mode from the drop-down list.
  12. The Deploy mode (new in Apstra version 5.0.0) defaults to Deploy. You have the option of setting it to Undeploy, from the drop-down list. If all interfaces that are facing the generic system are admin down, then you can't set the deploy mode to Deployed.
  13. Click Create to stage the change and return to the Topology view.

When you're ready to activate your changes, go to the Uncommitted tab to review and commit (or discard) your changes.

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