ZTP Fundamentals

Owned by Tracy Yang
Nov 18, 2024
3 min read

NOTEs:

  • Currently, the IPv6 ZTP is not supported.

  • You are suggested to implement ZTP for unconfigured devices, or the error prompts may appear.

  • Before using ZTP, you should configure the switch with two partitions of active partition and backup partition. The active partition can be used for upgrade and the backup partition can be used to save the current version, which can make sure the original version can be recovered once the upgrade is failed.

ZTP (Zero Touch Provisioning) is a technology for automated upgrade and configuration of unconfigured network devices. You can automatically upgrade and configure devices with the provision script of ZTP before the PicOS is up, obtaining the required configuration information without manual intervention, including IP addresses, routing, security policies, etc.

When large numbers of switches need to be upgraded to new versions or issued with configuration files, you can use ZTP to reduce labor costs and improve deployment efficiency. It can implement fast, accurate and reliable device deployment.

Typical Network

Figure 1. Typical network of ZTP

 

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The typical network of ZTP is shown as Figure1. The switch is served as the DHCP client, which uses information configured on the provision script or the DHCP server to locate necessary files on the file server, and sends logs to the Syslog server. The details of device role are shown as below:

  • DHCP client: the switch can be configured as DHCP client. By default, the client function of management interface eth0 (or VLAN 1 without eth0) is enabled, and the IP address assigned by DHCP server is configured for the management interface, which can be used to communicate with the file server.

  • DHCP server: allocates the management IP address, default gateway address, file server address and Syslog server address to clients.

  • File server (TFTP server or HTTP server): stores the files as needed, such as provision script, configuration file and software image. You can obtain these files from FS support stuffs. For detailed information of configuring TFTP server or HTTP server, see the third-party information.

  • Syslog server: Optional. It is required only when the switch need to send logs to the Syslog server.

ZTP Process

Figure 2. ZTP process

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The ZTP process is shown as above:

  1. The switch (DHCP client) is powered on and starts ZTP process.

  2. The client sends DHCP request packets to the DHCP server periodically to obtain the management IP address, gateway, file server IP address, boot file name and syslog server IP address. The DHCP server responds with the DHCP ACK packets containing the above information. The interaction is based on DHCP options, see Option Parameters.

If the client cannot successfully obtain the management IP address, file server address or boot file name, the switch will exit ZTP process.

  1. According to the above information, the switch obtains provision script from the file server and execute it. You can customize the script contents by running the generate_script, see Provision Script.

  2. The switch starts PicOS application (L2/L3 or OVS).

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