Troubleshooting Tip: Configuration may not be fully applied when injecting FortiFlex license via Cloud-Init

[CarlosColombini]

Description

This article explains the reason why configuration may be missing after injecting a FortiFlex license via cloud-init.

Scope

FortiGate v6.4.10+, v7.0.6+, v7.2.0+, FortiFlex License, Cloud Init.

Solution

Prior to FortiOS versions v6.4.10, v7.0.6, and v7.2.0, the license part of a multipart file (MIME) was always processed first. However, if there was no pre-configuration done in the FortiGate VM instance to allow it to reach FortiGuard Servers, it would fail to be applied. To address this issue, a multipart file is now processed in the order.

The multipart file supports 3 parts. The first two are required and the third one is optional, though recommended.

The parts are processed in order: 'pre-configuration', 'license token', and 'post-configuration'.

If the third part is not included and all configuration is done in the first part, the part configuration may fail because some features may depend on a certain license to be applied. To address this issue, it is recommended to add a third part containing all configuration, which is called 'post-configuration'.

See the example below of a sample multipart file with 3 components.

The first part is the network configuration (pre-configuration).

The second part is the VM license (license token information).

The third part is another configuration that will be applied after license installation (post-configuration).

Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="===============0266095039302191565=="
MIME-Version: 1.0

--===============0266095039302191565==
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="pre-config.txt"

config system interface
  edit port1
    set mode static
    set ip 172.16.165.71/24
  next
end

config router static
  edit 1
    set device port1
    set gateway 172.16.165.1
  next
end

--===============0266095039302191565==
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="license-token.txt"

LICENSE-TOKEN:ABCD

--===============0266095039302191565==
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="post-config.txt"

config system global
  set hostname FGT1-Flex
end

--===============0266095039302191565==--

Related documents:

• Inject a FortiFlex license via cloud-init.
• Support MIME multipart bootstrapping on KVM with config drive.
• Cloud-init documentation.