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Catalyst 2975 Switch Software Configuration Guide
OL-19720-02
Chapter 31 Configuring Network Security with ACLs
Configuring IPv4 ACLs
Note
When you apply the
ip access-group
interface configuration command to a Layer 3 SVI, the interface
must have an IP address. Layer 3 access groups filter packets that are routed or are received by Layer 3
processes on the CPU.
For inbound ACLs, after receiving a packet, the switch checks the packet against the ACL. If the ACL
permits the packet, the switch continues to process the packet. If the ACL rejects the packet, the switch
discards the packet.
For outbound ACLs, after receiving and sending a packet to a controlled interface, the switch checks the
packet against the ACL. If the ACL permits the packet, the switch sends the packet. If the ACL rejects
the packet, the switch discards the packet.
When you apply an undefined ACL to an interface, the switch acts as if the ACL has not been applied to
the interface and permits all packets. Remember this behavior if you use undefined ACLs for network
security.
Hardware and Software Treatment of IP ACLs
ACL processing is primarily accomplished in hardware, but requires forwarding of some traffic flows to
the CPU for software processing. If the hardware reaches its capacity to store ACL configurations,
packets are sent to the CPU for forwarding. The forwarding rate for software-forwarded traffic is
substantially less than for hardware-forwarded traffic.
If ACLs cause large numbers of packets to be sent to the CPU, the switch performance can be negatively
affected.
When you enter the
show ip access-lists
privileged EXEC command, the match count displayed does
not account for packets that are access controlled in hardware. Use the
show access-lists hardware
counters
privileged EXEC command to obtain some basic hardware ACL statistics for switched packets.
Troubleshooting ACLs
If this ACL manager message appears and [chars] is the access-list name,
ACLMGR-2-NOVMR: Cannot generate hardware representation of access list [chars]
The switch has insufficient resources to create a hardware representation of the ACL. The resources
include hardware memory and label space but not CPU memory. A lack of available logical operation
units or specialized hardware resources causes this problem. Logical operation units are needed for a
TCP flag match or a test other than
eq
(
ne
,
gt
,
lt
, or
range
) on TCP, UDP, or SCTP port numbers.
Use one of these workarounds:
•
Modify the ACL configuration to use fewer resources.
•
Rename the ACL with a name or number that alphanumerically precedes the ACL names or
numbers.
To determine the specialized hardware resources, enter the
show platform layer4 acl map
privileged
EXEC command. If the switch does not have available resources, the output shows that index 0 to
index 15 are not available.
For more information about configuring ACLs with insufficient resources, see CSCsq63926 in the Bug
Toolkit.