Chapter 4 Planning and Creating Communities
Creating a Community
Passwords
When connecting to a community, Network Assistant prompts you for each unique password that has already been assigned for members of the community. Network Assistant attempts to use these passwords to connect to other devices. You are prompted for a password only if the previously entered password does not work for a device.
For example, if a community has ten members, and five members share one password and the other five share a different password, Network Assistant prompts you twice, once for each password. Network Assistant does not save the passwords to your PC, so it prompts you for the passwords each time that you attempt to connect to a community.
Communication Protocols
Network Assistant uses HTTPS and HTTP to communicate with community members. It first tries to use HTTPS when using CDP to discover neighboring devices and when devices are added manually. If HTTPS fails, it tries again with HTTP.
The HTTPS port is fixed at 443; the HTTP port defaults to 80. You can specify a different HTTP port when you create a community. Afterward, you use the HTTP Port window to change the HTTP port. The port settings for both HTTPS and HTTP must be the same for all the members of a community.
Community Information
Network Assistant saves all individual device information, such as the IP address, the hostname, and the communication protocol, to your local PC. When Network Assistant connects to a community, it uses the locally saved data to rediscover the member devices.
If you try to use a different PC to manage an existing community, none of the member device information is available. You need to create the community again and add the same member devices.
Creating a Community
There are three ways to create a community:
•By discovering candidates that you can add to the community
•By manually adding devices
•By using the Cluster Conversion Wizard to convert a cluster into a community
You should verify that the community contains the devices that you think it contains. This section tells you how to perform these tasks.
Discovering and Adding Devices
Follow these steps to compile a list of candidate devices and to add them to a community:
1.Start Network Assistant, and select Connect to a new community in the Connect window. Click Connect.
2.In the Create Community window, enter a name for the community.
Getting Started with Cisco Network Assistant
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