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CLI commands for setting static Location information in AP

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  • 1.  CLI commands for setting static Location information in AP

    Posted May 25, 2023 10:36 AM

    Hi,

    i have been looking and it is not documented anywhere.
    Do we really have to contact  Tech Support for every AP we want to configure or are these commands published somewhere?

    from Aruba-Instant-8.11.0.0-User-Guide:

    For APs lacking the capability to automatically generate location information, their location can be
    manually configured. However, the static location information can be configured on the AP only using
    the CLI. Please contact Aruba Technical Support to configure the location information on your AP for
    LCI broadcast.



  • 2.  RE: CLI commands for setting static Location information in AP

    Posted May 25, 2023 12:20 PM

    This being a very new feature, I think the doc team hasn't gotten around to adding it to the CLI bank yet. I'm not directly in the loop, but I expect that you would only need to contact TAC the first time, and they can fill the role of that documentation to show you how to configure this until the external documentation can be written. The basic data format follows the same spec for sending location information to a client via DHCP as defined in RFC6225. I would share the specific commands here, but the info I was able to find is not currently cleared for public release... If that changes, I'll update here. I've also let the doc team know that the CLI bank lacks this info, so hopefully they can add it. 

    As a location services nerd, I'm very interested in this capability in 8.x, and excited to see it finally happen. Now we just need to get client device support, which so far seems to be on some newer Android devices and Intel chipset drivers. 

    Looking forward to playing with this in my lab, and would love to hear about your use case. 



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    Any opinions expressed here are solely my own and not necessarily that of Hewlett Packard Enterprise or Aruba Networks. For official support, please contact your account team or TAC.
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  • 3.  RE: CLI commands for setting static Location information in AP

    Posted May 25, 2023 01:44 PM

    Hi  canerdian

    well, similar to you, i am also big Location services nerd. I see huge potential, but i don't think that i would find something completely new that Aruba hasn't seen yet..
    But one thing would be for example position of handheld Zebra device with UXI agent when it encounters problems. So you can pinpoint where problem happened when it happened.

    I will play around with 635 in our lab, but i wanted to see if i can simulate this to our customer's install base who are on series 5xx. And i don't think devices are such problem as oldest models who supported this are already more than 3 years old (samsung s20 etc)..




  • 4.  RE: CLI commands for setting static Location information in AP

    Posted May 25, 2023 01:58 PM

    Here's the list of Android devices that support RTT...

    https://developer.android.com/guide/topics/connectivity/wifi-rtt#supported-phones



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    Any opinions expressed here are solely my own and not necessarily that of Hewlett Packard Enterprise or Aruba Networks. For official support, please contact your account team or TAC.
    ------------------------------
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  • 5.  RE: CLI commands for setting static Location information in AP

    Posted May 26, 2023 07:38 AM

    I got information from TAC how to calculate and manually setup LCI coordinates for 5xxx series. I don't know if it can be shared here.
    But basically calculation of location can be done like it is explained here: https://www.ietf.org/archive/id/draft-thomson-geopriv-3825bis-03.html 

    Once you have those values calculated, you feed that to AP, enable LCI advertisement and voila, you're up and running. 

    I am going to test this next week to see how it works. I will also connect to 635 and compare results.




  • 6.  RE: CLI commands for setting static Location information in AP

    Posted May 26, 2023 09:21 AM

    A nice touch is that the data portion of the vendor IE field in the beacon is the same format as RFC6225, because why reinvent the wheel? 


    now we just need client device support, and for Apple and Google BSSID location databases to recognize it on a scan, and for Windows drivers to use it for system location. 


    in theory, now that the AP knows where it is, one should be able to write an IoT connector that can feed Tile, AirTag, etc. 



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    Any opinions expressed here are solely my own and not necessarily that of Hewlett Packard Enterprise or Aruba Networks. For official support, please contact your account team or TAC.
    ------------------------------
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  • 7.  RE: CLI commands for setting static Location information in AP

    Posted May 26, 2023 09:24 AM

    I also believe that the UXI agent for Zebra scanners explicitly supports this. 



    ------------------------------
    ------------------------------
    Any opinions expressed here are solely my own and not necessarily that of Hewlett Packard Enterprise or Aruba Networks. For official support, please contact your account team or TAC.
    ------------------------------
    ------------------------------



  • 8.  RE: CLI commands for setting static Location information in AP

    Posted May 29, 2023 09:50 AM

    Do you maybe know how many AP's we need for this to work? Is there a number how many 6xx series?
    i have 3x635 in my lab and some 5xxx.

    Would for example 3x505 and 1x635 work and self-locate?





  • 9.  RE: CLI commands for setting static Location information in AP

    Posted May 30, 2023 12:35 PM

    Hi, 

    The APs alone will not self-locate. It will require the upcoming "Auto AP placement" feature in Aruba Central Next Generation.

    Until its available you can use the WifiRttLocator App and the WifiRttScan App to play with FTM location. 
     

    Regards,

    Jens




  • 10.  RE: CLI commands for setting static Location information in AP

    Posted May 30, 2023 01:12 PM

    However, If you manually locate each of the APs (admittedly, a tedious task, which Auto Locate is designed to eliminate), they should still be able to send out the LCI in the beacons and the neighbor reports - and if you happen to have a client device that knows what to do with the LCI (like maybe updating the operating system's BSSID Location database) and the FTM into the OS location services, then you're in business. 

    it's a bit of a chicken and eg situation - if the information isn't available in the AP, then why would client device makers go the extra step to support it... But if it's not supported, then AP deployments have no reason to go through the brain damage of sending that information out in the first place (since it does slightly increase the beacon size)

    There is definitely some benefit to supporting this in 8.x campus networks, even if it has to be done manually (or using external programming and automation). I hope civic location information is coming soon too. 



    ------------------------------
    ------------------------------
    Any opinions expressed here are solely my own and not necessarily that of Hewlett Packard Enterprise or Aruba Networks. For official support, please contact your account team or TAC.
    ------------------------------
    ------------------------------



  • 11.  RE: CLI commands for setting static Location information in AP

    Posted May 30, 2023 01:21 PM

    As long as the APs support FTM responder (which should be any 5XX/6XX AP), they should support this. To use a combination of FTM and LCI to locate the client device, you would need at least 3 APs to get an accurate fix, just as you would with RSSI based multilateration on wifi or bluetooth - but flight time isn't affected by attenuation the way RSSI measurements are, so it would be considerably more accurate, especially farther out from the APs (because of inverse square law, RSSI becomes less accurate as distance increases, even with clear LOS, more so with attenuation in the way, like warehouse racks)

    It's my understanding that the field is designed to be populated by the onboard GNSS receiver in the 6XX APs (for use by the frequency coordination process required for outdoor and high power on 6GHz). 




    ------------------------------
    ------------------------------
    Any opinions expressed here are solely my own and not necessarily that of Hewlett Packard Enterprise or Aruba Networks. For official support, please contact your account team or TAC.
    ------------------------------
    ------------------------------



  • 12.  RE: CLI commands for setting static Location information in AP

    Posted Mar 13, 2024 10:04 AM

    Hi, 

    is "Auto AP placement" now available in the new Aruba Central rollout?

    Can we set up 




  • 13.  RE: CLI commands for setting static Location information in AP

    Posted Mar 14, 2024 03:44 AM

    No, "AP auto-placement" will be part of Next Generation HPE Aruba Networking Central (video) which is not general avaialble yet. 




  • 14.  RE: CLI commands for setting static Location information in AP

    Posted May 30, 2023 03:07 PM

    Three APs are the minimum required to support an indoor positioning by the client.

    See for example the WifiRttLocator App documentation:

    User manual: https://g.co/wifirtt/locator-user-guide
    Example floor plan: https://g.co/wifirtt/example-house-floorplan
    Example configuration file: https://g.co/wifirtt/example-house-config




  • 15.  RE: CLI commands for setting static Location information in AP

    Posted May 30, 2023 12:25 PM

    Hi, 
    The UXI agent for Zebra support FTM based location in combination with an Aruba Central managed FTM enabled Wi-Fi network (including VisualRF maps configured and APs placed). The UXI account have to be connected with the Aruba Central account for the agent to be able to download map and AP information. 

    As of today the UX agent for Zebra determines its relative location using FTM if connection issues are recognized e.g. roaming failures and records the location is the UXI log and troubleshooting information.