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Dparaskevas
Dparaskevas
Visitor III
September 6, 2022
Question

FortiAP cant discover AC on FortyCloud

  • September 6, 2022
  • 3 replies
  • 4047 views

Hay all,

 

  • I have 2 FortiAP221e.
  • I have register them on my Fortilan network using their FortiAP cloud key.
  • AP have access to the internet ( I can ping 8.8.8.8 through CLI)

BUT they cant find the Controller on the FortiLan. The status of the device appearing in the GUI of the aps :  AC Discovery Status: Discovering AC 

 

Am I doing anything wrong?

 

thank you in advance,

Dimitris Paraskevas

3 replies

Rathan_FTNT
Staff
Rathan_FTNT
Staff
September 6, 2022

Hello Dimitris,
Refer the below if this helps  to solve your issue 

https://docs.fortinet.com/document/fortiap/latest/fortiwifi-and-fortiap-cookbook/540137/discovering-authorizing-and-deauthorizing-fortiap-units#:~:text=The%20FortiAP%20acquires%20the%20AC%27s%20IP%20address%20by%20resolving%20a%20preconfigured%20FQDN.&text=FortiGate%20Cloud%20discovers%20the%20FortiAP.&text=FortiAP%20is%20discovered%20by%20sending%20broadcasts%20in%20its%20local%20subnet.&text=FortiAP%20is%20discovered%20by%20sending%20discovery,a%20multicast%20address%20of%20224.0.

There are six methods that a FortiAP unit can use to discover a WiFi controller.

1(static) → 2(dhcp) → 3(dns) → 7(forticloud) → 5(multicast) → 6(broadcast)


Static IP configuration:

To specify the controller’s IP address on a FortiAP unit:
cfg –a AC_IPADDR_1="192.168.0.100"
To configure Static IP on AP:
cfg -a ADDR_MODE=STATIC
cfg –a AP_IPADDR="192.168.0.100"
cfg -a AP_NETMASK="255.255.255.0"
cfg –a IPGW=192.168.0.1
cfg -c

DHCP:

When configuring the DHCP server, configure Option 138 to specify the WiFi controller IP address.

Convert the address into hexadecimal. Convert each octet value separately from left to right and concatenate them. For example, 192.168.0.1 converts to C0A80001.

The following is the command to change the FortiAP DHCP option code. In this example, the command use option code 140:
cfg –a AC_DISCOVERY_DHCP_OPTION_CODE=140

DNS:

For the access point to do so, configure the DNS to return controller IP addresses in response.

Allow DNS lookup of the hostname configured in the AP by using the AP parameter "AC_HOSTNAME_1".


FortiCloud:

The access point can discover FortiCloud by doing a DNS lookup of the hardcoded FortiCloud AP controller hostname "apctrl1.fortinet.com".

The FortiCloud AC discovery technique finds the AC info from apctl1.fortinet.com using HTTPS.

FortiCloud APController: apctrl1.fortinet.com:443 208.91.113.187:443


Multicast request:

The AP unit sends a multicast discovery request and the controller replies with a unicast discovery response message.

The AP and the controller do not need to be in the same broadcast domain if multicast routing is properly configured.

The default multicast destination address is 224.0.1.140. It can be changed through the CLI. The address must be same on the controller and AP.

To change the multicast address on the controller:
config wireless-controller global
    set discovery-mc-addr 224.0.1.250
end
To change the multicast address on a FortiAP unit:
cfg –a AC_DISCOVERY_MC_ADDR="224.0.1.250"

Broadcast request:

The AP unit broadcasts a discovery request message to the network and the controller replies.

The AP and the controller must be in the same broadcast domain. No configuration adjustments are required.

Regards,

Rathan

    Dparaskevas
    DparaskevasAuthor
    Visitor III
    September 7, 2022

    thank you for your reply, 

     

    ok i can understand the discovery types.

    I want to use the forticloud.

    Is there any configuration i have to make into the AP so it will find the controller or does it search automatically for it?

     

    Update: I haven't changed anything but sometimes it shows me 
    Discovered AC with FortiCloud Account: xxxxxx@xxxxx.gr

    forticloud.png

     

    But they still offline on my network managment in fortilan cloud.

     

    The above status shows just for a momment and then this appear:

    Discovering AC ... (Next cloud request in 1434 minutes)

     

    BB8
    BB8
    New Member
    September 6, 2022

    the suggest did not work for me.

    I am adding APs on to a new account. Does it mater in this case?

    Maybe the account cant be found?

    fluthersmack
    fluthersmack
    New Member
    September 7, 2022

    Hi, I'm a new too ! Unfortunately, I was unable to benefit from the suggest feature. I'm now accumulating APs to a brand new account. When applied to this scenario, is it relevant. Perhaps there is no trace of the account.

     

     

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