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It’s now the fourth time in a row that I had the prospect to be a part of the Cisco NOC workforce for Cisco Dwell EMEA.
If we go even additional again in time, I had the prospect to go to Cisco Dwell for the Technical Design Clinics again in London and Berlin. The strain was on the shoulders of the NOC workforce who needed to ship a working Wi-Fi community with so many random consumer gadgets related. I didn’t envy their place (though I admired it). I notably keep in mind a bug from smartphone distributors in Cisco Dwell London that was repeating the occasion SSID as a private hotspot, inflicting plenty of hassle to different consumer connectivity. This was the 12 months the CiscoLive SSID went from absolutely open to a pre-shared key SSID to stop that kind of drawback.
Finish of 2017, the NOC workforce invited me to be a part of the Wi-fi Controller workforce for Cisco Dwell Barcelona 2018. I accepted rapidly principally for the sake of being a part of the Cisco Dwell occasion, which I think about a privilege. I found since then how establishing a big occasions community is such a singular endeavor and can attempt to give some insights into sure selections and selections.
The Planning
Round summer time the 12 months earlier than the occasion, the primary conferences begin. We arrange a workforce and ensure we have now the most effective folks for the job at each place. That is the duty of Remco Kamerman, the Cisco Dwell NOC workforce lead and just about the one mounted workforce member since he recruits the remainder of us. Some folks from the software program engineering groups, some salespeople, and a few CX folks (TAC, Buyer Success, and Skilled Companies): workforce members should not picked for his or her job position however for his or her experience. In case you are one of many high folks in your know-how, likelihood is that you simply already know an excellent a part of the NOC workforce for having labored with them all year long since they’re the highest folks too.
Mapping Insanity
We obtain the venue plans and occasion blueprints early on however they hold altering till the final day (much less and fewer as time goes by after all). That is the problem of the design people within the workforce (Skilled Companies and System Engineers principally) who need to do a wi-fi design principally by taking a look at usually altering plans. A couple of web site visits had been organized to get a sense of the venue. I used to be there on the primary day the constructing workforce began constructing for the occasion and might testify that the variety of bodily modifications the venue goes by way of in simply a few days is unthinkable in case you are not used to such occasions.
Maps are an necessary a part of managing a wi-fi community. We may leverage the interoperability between the venue maps on the RAI Prime Infrastructure equipment, the Cisco DNA Heart we used for the occasion, and the Ekahau design software program we used for the design. Maps had been cross-imported between these 3 locations in order that we may have the right maps for design and day-to-day administration.
Keynote Design
A particular problem was the keynote space which consisted of 4500 chairs round a central stage in an empty corridor. 50 9104 stadium antennas had been used to offer protection from the trusses. Mounting these APs/antennas required very shut collaboration with the keynote space construct workforce as there are particular moments the place the truss is down and accessible after which introduced up (after which you want a scissor elevate to entry it and also you need to keep away from that as a lot as potential for effectivity)
The Construct Up
The vast majority of the NOC workforce consists of individuals truly bodily build up the community. That requires deploying lots of of switches all through the venue and the cabling that goes with that with out something seen to the bare eye. It additionally requires deploying lots of of wi-fi entry factors in varied locations. They are often on poles, partitions, or ceilings, and mounting elegantly and effectively turns into an artwork.
Just like the Fira Barcelona, we inherited round 400 Wi-Fi entry factors from the RAI Amsterdam venue. They had been good sufficient to allow us to management their entry factors at some point of the occasion. This fashion, we don’t need to cope with two separate wi-fi networks. A great a part of the venue APs had been Cisco 9120s with directional antennas mounted on the very excessive ceiling (in addition to some 9104s in a single Corridor) that are excellent for offering common protection.
Certainly the RAI hosts plenty of totally different reveals that don’t have anything in widespread (Cisco Dwell was between a horse present and a pregnancy-related present) and their Wi-Fi community wants to remain secure between occasions. Nevertheless, since we’re Cisco and we’re prepared to deploy a community only for our personal occasion, we may add entry factors on the floor degree and be higher oriented for particular functions (on the whole, the shut the AP is to the shoppers, the higher, in case you can afford it). We knew the high-density areas and extra sophisticated floor areas the place extra protection could be welcome and that’s what our design consisted of.
Occasion Wi-Fi Decisions
Traditionally, the primary SSID is WPA2 PSK SSID and the group prints the important thing on the occasion badge everybody wears. We added EduRoam assist for our schooling clients to have an SSID their gadget already is aware of and might connect with, utilizing their schooling credentials. We additionally added OpenRoaming, the place your gadget mechanically connects to the Wi-Fi as quickly as you enter the venue in case you already had an OpenRoaming profile put in in your gadget. In the event you didn’t you may set up one from the CiscoLive occasion app. Personally, I put in an OpenRoaming profile on my iPhone after my native grocery store created a profile for me from their app. My telephone mechanically related, in a safe and clear method, to the venue as quickly as I arrived with my profile from my native grocery store due to the RAI additionally having an OpenRoaming SSID even earlier than Cisco arrived onsite.
We positively wished to maintain the variety of SSIDs provided as little as potential to keep away from confusion and to maintain the wifi community effectivity to the utmost potential, however the comfort (and the safety!) of OpenRoaming and Eduroam satisfied us to supply these as further providers.
Wi-Fi 6E
This 12 months, we wished to supply 6ghz Wi-Fi as 6E is the latest coolest factor. The issue is that offering this throughout the entire occasion would have meant buying lots of of 9166 entry factors. This isn’t potential as we prioritize buyer deliveries for the primary time on a brand new gadget. It could even have meant changing all of the venue APs which is impractical for us. We then coated your entire Assembly Village corridor with the 40 9166 we had. The problem with this hybrid method is that Wi-Fi 6E requires WPA3 and we didn’t need to make the primary SSID WPA3 but.
Even when the CiscoLive inhabitants is usually nerdy (it’s a praise these days I believe) and effectively outfitted, you wouldn’t imagine a few of the older gadgets that connect with the community and WPA3 assist is simply not at 100% but we imagine. We needed to create a separate WPA3 SSID which was broadcasted each in 5Ghz and 6Ghz (however 6ghz being solely out there within the Assembly Village) for compatibility causes.
Legacy and “Bells and Whistles” SSIDs
As a common rule, is nice observe to have some type of legacy SSID and a few type of extra performing SSIDs with extra bells and whistles. Some years in the past, it meant we offered a Cisco Dwell Legacy SSID which existed on 2.4ghz, whereas the 5Ghz was the primary and “cool” SSID.
In Cisco Dwell 2023, we utterly gave up on 2.4ghz and the CiscoLive SSID was solely out there on 5Ghz. This meant the primary CiscoLive SSID wanted to have essentially the most suitable settings to make sure all of the shoppers may join and that meant giving up on some nice Cisco options (like System Analytics) for the sake of most compatibility. I predict that very quickly, the WPA3/6Ghz SSID will grow to be the primary SSID and the 5Ghz-only/WPA2 SSID would be the legacy one. Possibly too early for that to occur subsequent 12 months however why not 2025?
How the Occasion Went
Keynote and 6ghz
The occasion went very effectively total. In the course of the keynote or the celebration, throughput exams returned surprisingly good outcomes. The 9104 antennas had been actually shocked by their well-defined protection space with very small leakage exterior of the protection route. This actually helps with channel reuse in a big venue corridor.
It was an excellent shock to see greater than 60% of the Wi-fi shoppers utilizing Wi-Fi 6. Nevertheless, only some dozen supported 6E. We anticipate a pointy improve by subsequent 12 months, however it can keep a minority of shoppers. There have been a few 802.11n shoppers however actually not many.
The highest simultaneous consumer rely was round 13 500. It’s barely decrease than the final occasion in Barcelona. We anticipate the occasion to develop by subsequent 12 months since this was the primary one post-Covid.
{Hardware} and Software program Concerns
It was the primary Cisco Dwell we ran 100% on the Catalyst 9800 in EMEA and 100% on Cisco DNA Heart. Certainly in 2020, they had been there however we nonetheless had 8540 WLCs within the community. We ran the 17.9.2 CCO software program and solely had minor points to report. As is turning into increasingly more commonplace, more often than not we spent troubleshooting was on interoperability points with particular gadget sorts and options. Utterly disabling 2.4Ghz was an ideal thought as a result of we seen an elevated utilization of Bluetooth among the many attendees and the Wi-Fi community would have disturbed all these Bluetooth gadgets.
Not every little thing was excellent although, it could actually by no means be in such a big occasion with so many new applied sciences. However I’m glad we hold bettering 12 months after 12 months. There are all the time areas of grievance when the consumer density is larger than what we anticipated: there have been some very profitable periods in Devnet theater or World of Options and connectivity was subpar throughout these occasions. We’ll be certain that to give you an enchancment plan for subsequent 12 months to make that higher.
Conclusion
The massive duty to run such a community is made bearable by the actual fact the NOC workforce is crammed with superior folks. In that workforce, each opinion to make issues higher and smoother is welcome and the target is to all the time enhance 12 months over 12 months. It’s all the time sophisticated to juggle between monitoring the community from the NOC and going to a location for some bodily Wi-Fi troubleshooting. Cisco DNA Heart was positively an enormous enchancment on this level the place Assurance helps us triage points rapidly. It additionally helped us slim down tough areas instantly and dispatch engineers accordingly.
2023 was the 12 months the place we automated plenty of the deployment however that’s a complete story to inform.
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