Add a VLAN to a UCS blade via the CLI

So my UCS Manager GUI was having certificate problems today in my test lab and I really wanted to get something done. I think I need to update UCSM from 2.0(1s) to one of the latest, but that’s a project in itself, especially if I can’t just click-click-click my way through. What I really wanted to do was add a couple existing VLANs to the vNIC of an ESXi host on a blade (so I could vMotion some stuff around). Of course, with the GUI, it’s a few clicks. Without the GUI (and not knowing where to go in the CLI), I was at a bit of a loss.

The UCS CLI guide wasn’t helpful as it was more for managing the hardware or upstream configs – not so much for what would seem like a task made for UCSM. So to get on with it, let me share the quick config for adding VLANs to vNICs. This post actually got me in the ballpark (just search for “vlan” in the post), but from there, I was on my own!

So unless you know the exact name of the VLAN you created in UCSM in the first place, you’ll have to look it up. You do that like so:

UCS-A# scope eth-uplink 
UCS-A# / eth-uplink # show vlan 

VLAN:
    Name       VLAN ID    Fabric ID Native VLAN Sharing Type Primary Vlan
    ---------- ---------- --------- ----------- ------------ ------------
    AC         198        Dual      No          None
    CONEXIS-TEST-CIFS1
               215        Dual      No          None
    CONEXIS-TEST-CIFS2
               216        Dual      No          None
    CTRL       193        Dual      No          None
    CUPS       197        Dual      No          None
    default    1          Dual      Yes         None
    ISCSI      199        Dual      No          None
    ISE        201        Dual      No          None
    MGMT       191        Dual      No          None
    NCS        202        Dual      No          None
    NEXUS1000V 206        Dual      No          None
    NFS        207        Dual      No          None
    SAMMONS-COLO
               78         Dual      No          None
    TEST-11082012
               233        Dual      No          None
    TEST05082012
               505        Dual      No          None
    UCCX       196        Dual      No          None
    UCM        194        Dual      No          None
    UCXN       195        Dual      No          None
    vCloud300  300        Dual      No          None
    vCloud301  301        Dual      No          None
    vCloud302  302        Dual      No          None
    vCloud303  303        Dual      No          None
    vCloud304  304        Dual      No          None
    vCloud305  305        Dual      No          None
    vCloud306  306        Dual      No          None
    vCloud307  307        Dual      No          None
    vCloud308  308        Dual      No          None
    vCloud309  309        Dual      No          None
    vCloud310  310        Dual      No          None
    vCloud311  311        Dual      No          None
    vCloud312  312        Dual      No          None
    vCloud313  313        Dual      No          None
    vCloud314  314        Dual      No          None
    VFILER-232 232        Dual      No          None
    VLAN231-TEST
               231        Dual      No          None
    vMotion    208        Dual      No          None
    WINDOWS    200        Dual      No          None
    ZOOM-SPAN  205        Dual      No          None

Say we want to add VLANs 201 and 202 for ISE and NCS, respectively, to the first vNIC of blade 1 in our only chassis. You’ll have to note the names of these VLANs because that’s how they’re addressed when they’re added. We’ll then move to that particular vNIC scope. So let’s exit back to the main UCS prompt and enter

UCS-A# scope service-profile server 1/1  

You’ll also have to address the vNIC by it’s given name, so find that with

UCS-A /org/service-profile # show vnic

vNIC:
    Name       Fabric ID Dynamic MAC Addr
    ---------- --------- ----------------
    vNIC1      A B       00:25:B5:00:00:7F
    vNIC2      B A       00:25:B5:00:00:6F

UCS-A /org/service-profile # scope vnic vNIC1  

You add the VLAN with this command

UCS-A /org/service-profile/vnic # create eth-if ISE  

You’ll see the prompt change again, including as asterisk at the end to indicate you haven’t committed your changes. So commit the changes like so

UCS-A /org/service-profile/vnic/eth-if* # commit-buffer   

Finally, you can verify you’ve added the VLAN by running

UCS-A /org/service-profile/vnic # show eth-if 

Name: ISE
Dynamic MAC Addr: 00:25:B5:00:00:7F
Default Network: No
VLAN ID: 201
Operational VLAN: fabric/lan/net-ISE

Name: NCS
Dynamic MAC Addr: 00:25:B5:00:00:7F
Default Network: No
VLAN ID: 202
Operational VLAN: fabric/lan/net-NCS

I don’t know how often someone would need this, but I know I didn’t find a walkthrough on it – there’s one now, though!

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