Wireless Access

I am new to working with Aruba Wireless and how to design it very well.  This might be a silly question; but, I do not wish to assume anything.  It is our intention to use a standardized Wireless System at different satalight offices and I want to make sure I can do that with Aruba and Mobility Master.

We have the following layout with an older system that we wish to replace with Aruba.

- Employee Network Wireless Lan is called "Employee"

- Guest LAN is called "Comp_Guest"

We have 5 diffrent satelite offices and they all have the same name for the 2 above mentioned Wireless Lans.  With our new Aruba setup we desire to use the same naming scheme for the above mentioend Wireless networks.  I have already cut-over to Aruba at 1 office and that is working very well.

Under Mobility Master - Managed Network: I have 5 different Groups.  Inside each group we have 2 local managed controllers.  Please see the attached picture.

For security reasons with RADIUS Servers and guest access each Employee network is confgured at the Group Level because we have diffrent RADIUS servers local to each office.  Hence, the Employee WLAN in 1 specific Group/Location does not use the RADIUS Servers at another Group/Location

Hence the Employee - WLAN and the Corp_Guest - WLan are created at the group level not from the Managed Network level.

My quesiton is, is there any problem having the same name WLAN at different group/locations?  I see when you are viewing the Managend Network - Dashboard - WLANS window I can see the WLans from all of the groups.  How will that view when different locations have the same SSID name?

I have already cut-over to the Aruba Wireless system at 1 location/group.  The wireless is working out very well I originally anamed the Wireless LAN "Employee_TX" then changed the name at the group level to "Employee".  

So the Managed Network - Dashboard window is diaplaying Employee, Employee_CA, Employee_GA; but, they will all be named Employee after we are all cut-over.  I have not changed the other site names yet (only 1 so far) I would think this is not going to be a problem since Aruba is designed to be a scalable system for multiple locations.

Can anyone tell me from their exoerience with the same Wireless LAN names at different locations?

Most corporations that have multiple locations name their SSIDs the same so that they only have to configure endpoint devices once.

With that being said, do you have contact with your Aruba Account SE?  I am asking because you are at a crucial point in your deployment and I want it to go well.

I have crated a case with support to ask them.  I think the onlything that will happen in the Dashbouard is that the Names may show up as 'Employee', 'Employee2' , 'Employee3' from the managed Network - Dashboard side.  

The configuration should be working just the Dashboard display (view only) is in question.

Currently Employee is working independantly from teh other locations at (Employee_MN) for example.

I mean, do you have an Aruba Sales Engineer or Aruba Reseller helping you with the design.  TAC really only helps with specific issues, but design is crucial for success...

Sorry for the missunderstanding.  No I do not have anyone helping me with the design.

Aruba Support informed me that the Dashboard - Wlans window will display the combined information for the SSID name.  The dasboard will simply show all of the APs, Clients, RFadios and other inforamtion for all of the Managed networks.  Hence if you have a WLAN named 'Employee' the Dashboard will display all of the AP from difrerent locaitons that are using that same SSID name.  Of location 1 has 5 Aps and Locaiton 2 has anophter 5 Aps and both locations are using the same 'Employee' SSID name, then the dashboard will just compbine the APs, Clients, etc. from the 2 locations.

The important thing is to have the SSID Profile in different AP Groups, which I do because I have a spearate Ap Group for each location.  One cannot use the same SSID name for 2 or more WLans on the same AP group.

I will test this out by creating a hidden guest WLan with a 'Test1' name at 1 Group.  Then create a hidden guest WLAN also named Test1' at anothen location.  These WLans named 'Test1' will have different AP Groups assigned to each other.  Then I will see how the Dshboard displays the Test1 WLan and how many AP's are associated with the Test1 WLan name.

Otherwise the answer woudl be to have 'Employee_TX' and 'Employee_CA' which is not a bad option.  But I am curious to how the Dashboard will display Test1 WLan name.

My test verified that the 'SSID' names just simply combined information.  The number of APs and Radios, etc.  It appears that the dashboard - WLANs window just shows the collected information per WLAN name.  So if one has the same SSID name at different locations and with different AP Groups, the Managed Network - Dashboard simply combines all of the information for that SSID name.

It does not affect the performance or the display in  a bad way.  One may still navigate down to the folder/group level and look at the dasboard from that group level for more specifc information.

Does anyone have any other ideas/concerns regarding the configuration of having the Same SSID name at different Groups but each  SSID is associated with different AP Groups at different Managed Network Falders groups.

When the 2 SSIds have the same name.  I can succesfully login to 2 of those SSIDs (from different locations). Even though both WLans have the same SSID.  Theyu just compabine client informatin and display that in the dasboard.  It works.