Dell Brocade DCX, Configuration Manual

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BigIron RX Series Configuration Guide 291
53-1001810-01
VLAN groups
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There is a separate STP domain for each port-based VLAN. Routing occurs independently across
port-based VLANs or STP domains. You can define each end of each backbone link as a separate
tagged port-based VLAN. Routing will occur independently across the port-based VLANs. Because
each port-based VLAN’s STP domain is a single point-to-point backbone connection, you are
guaranteed to never have an STP loop. STP will never block the virtual router interfaces within the
tagged port-based VLAN, and you will have a fully routed backbone.
A device offers the ability to create a virtual routing interface within a Layer 2 STP port-based VLAN
or within each IP protocol VLAN. This combination of multiple Layer 2 or Layer 3 broadcast domains
and virtual routing interfaces are the basis for Brocade’ very powerful Integrated Switch Routing
(ISR) technology. ISR is very flexible and can solve many networking problems.
VLAN groups
To simplify VLAN configuration when you have many VLANs with the same configuration, you can
configure
VLAN groups . When you create a VLAN group, the VLAN parameters you configure for the
group apply to all the VLANs within the group.
The VLAN group feature allows you to create multiple port-based VLANs with identical port
members. Since the member ports are shared by all the VLANs within the group, you must add the
ports as tagged ports. This feature not only simplifies VLAN configuration but also allows you to
have a large number of identically configured VLANs in a startup configuration file on the device’s
flash memory module. Normally, a startup configuration file with a large number of VLANs might
not fit on the flash memory module. By grouping the identically configured VLANs, you can
conserve space in the startup configuration file so that it fits on the flash memory module.
You can create up to 32 VLAN groups
NOTE
Depending on the size of the VLAN ID range you want to use for the VLAN group, you might need to
allocate additional memory for VLANs. To allocate additional memory, refer to
“Allocating memory
for more VLANs or virtual routing interfaces” on page 311.
Configuring a VLAN group
To configure a VLAN group, do the following.
1. Create the VLAN group and assign the VLANs to that group.
BigIron RX (config)# vlan-group 1 vlan 2 to 1000
Syntax: [no] vlan-group <num> vlan <vlan-id> to <vlan-id>
Use 1 – 32 for <num> parameter with the vlan-group command specifies the VLAN group ID
and can be from.
The vlan <vlan-id> to <vlan-id> parameters specify a continuous range (with no gaps) of VLAN
IDs that have not been configured in the CLI. Specify the low VLAN ID first and the high VLAN
ID second. The command adds all the VLANs in the range to the VLAN group.
If a VLAN within the range you specify is already configured, the CLI does not add the group but
instead displays an error message. If this happens, create the group by specifying a valid
contiguous range that does not include the VLAN. Then add more VLANs to the group after the
CLI changes to the configuration level for the group.