Summary

Question

Customer Environment

Workaround

Resolution

The RUCKUS ZoneDirector (ZD) 1200 is designed to manage wireless networks with various features and licensing requirements. When deploying a ZD 1200 in Smart Redundancy (SR) mode, it is important to understand the licensing constraints and procedures to ensure optimal performance and compliance.

Licensing Requirements

1. Permanent Licenses:

   • Mandatory for SR Mode: Smart Redundancy mode requires permanent licenses to operate. Temporary licenses cannot be used in SR environments.
   • Purpose: Permanent licenses ensure that the ZD 1200 device can fully support Smart Redundancy features, providing consistent and reliable network management.

2. Temporary Licenses:

   • Not Compatible with SR Mode: Temporary licenses are not supported in Smart Redundancy mode. These licenses are intended for short-term use and cannot be used to enable or operate SR mode.

Once you enable Smart Redundancy on ZD 1200, the licenses on the primary and standby ZDs are pooled together. If the primary ZD goes defective or is removed from the pool, the standby ZD will act as the primary controller and start to manage all the APs automatically for the next 60 days.

Once the replacement for the primary controller returns to the pool within 60 days, the new ZD will stay as a standby controller until the current primary fails, gets rebooted or force failure is selected on the SR configuration.

If a replacement for the primary controller does not return to the pool within 60 days, then the current primary controller (originally configured as a standby controller) will only manage the number of APs that it is licensed to manage prior to enabling Smart Redundancy.

Example:
Two ZD 1200 with 25 AP licenses each, once smart redundancy is enabled between them, active ZD 1200 shows the total number of AP licenses as 50 and is capable of managing 50 APs.
After the 60th day, if the primary controller is not returned to the pool, the primary controller (originally configured as a standby controller) will have only 25 APs connected to it.

Configuration: With permanent licenses in place, configure Smart Redundancy mode. This involves setting up a primary and secondary ZD 1200 device to ensure high availability and failover capabilities.