VLAN Trunking

protocol
CCNA Exploration Semester 3
Chapter 4

13 May 2015

S Ward Abingdon and Witney College

Topics
The

role of VLAN Trunking Protocol (VTP)

Operation of VTP
Configure VTP on switches

13 May 2015

S Ward Abingdon and

Witney College

Semester 3
LAN Design
Basic Switch
Concepts

Wireless

VLANs

STP

VTP

Inter-VLAN
routing

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Purpose of VTP
You

can create VLANs on a switch.

What if you have the same VLANs on 10
linked switches? Or 100 linked switches?
Do you have to create the VLANs on every
switch and allow them on each trunk?
VTP helps.
But you still have to assign access ports to
VLANs on each switch.
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VTP domain
Group

of layer 2 switches sharing VLAN data.

Ends at router or layer 3 switch.
Switch can be linked but not part of domain.
Each switch can belong to only one domain.
Domain is defined by its name.
Proprietary to Cisco, so all switches in
domain must be Cisco switches.
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VTP server
One

switch acts as server.

Create VLANs on this switch.
Information saved in vlan.dat.
Server sends VLAN information to client
switches over active trunk links.
Add, delete, rename VLANs on server.
Default mode of switch is server.
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VTP client
Client

receives VLAN information from server.

Client switches then have the same VLANs
as the server.
Client does not save VLAN information. It is
held only in RAM and lost if switch is
powered off.

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S Ward Abingdon and

Witney College

VTP modes
Server

default mode. Sends VLAN

information to other switches.
Client receives VLAN information and
forwards it to other switches.
Transparent forward VTP traffic but do not
originate or use it. They can have their own
VLANs, not shared with other switches.

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S Ward Abingdon and

Witney College

VTP defaults
Version

1. (Versions 2 and 3 also exist.)

VTP domain name is not set.
VTP mode server
One active VLAN, VLAN 1
Configuration revision number 0
Any switches added to a domain should be in
the default condition or they may send
unwanted information to other switches.
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S Ward Abingdon and

Witney College

Show vtp status

VTP Version
Maximum VLANs Supported
Number of Existing VLANs
VTP Operating Mode- server, client, or transparent.
VTP Domain Name
VTP Pruning Mode
VTP V2 Mode (disabled by default)
VTP Traps Generation
MD5 Digest (checksum of VTP configuration)
Configuration Last Modified
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VTP advertisements
Consist

of VTP header and VTP message

Encapsulated inside Ethernet frame with tag
to pass over trunk link.
Destination MAC address is multicast
address 01-00-0C-CC-CC-CC

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VTP message header

Domain

name
Domain name length
Version - VTP 1 or VTP 2, on Cisco 2960
switch.
Configuration revision number
Other fields, depending on type of message.

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Configuration revision number

32-bit

number.
Default value is 0.
It is incremented each time a VLAN is added
or removed.
Reset to 0 is domain name changes.
Switch uses it to see if information is more
recent that what it already holds.

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Summary advertisement
Sent

immediately after a change is made,

with updated revision number.
Sent every 5 minutes by servers and clients
to check on current VTP configuration
revision number.
Contains the VTP domain name, the current
revision number, and other VTP configuration
details.
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VTP Summary advertisement

A switch receives a summary advertisement.

Compares domain name to its own domain name.
If name is different, the switch ignores the packet.
If the name is the same, the switch compares the
revision number to its own revision number.
Number higher or equal, ignored the packet.
Number lower, sends an advertisement request.

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Request Advertisement
Sent by client to server if:
The VTP domain name has been changed
The switch receives a summary
advertisement with a higher configuration
revision number than its own
A subset advertisement message is missed
for some reason
The switch has been reset
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Subset advertisement
Contains

VLAN information. Several may be

needed if there is a lot of information.
Sent by server in response to a request or
after:

Creating or deleting a VLAN

Suspending or activating a VLAN
Changing the name of a VLAN
Changing the MTU of a VLAN

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Subset advertisement
Version

Code Seq-number Domain name length

Management domain name (padded to 32 bytes)

Configuration revision number
VLAN info field 1
VLAN info field 2
Etc.

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Subset advertisement VLAN info

VLAN-Info
Info length
ISL VLAN ID

Status

VLAN-Type

VLAN-name
Len

MTU size

802.10 index
VLAN name (padded to multiple of 4 bytes)

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Pros and cons

Small

network dont bother with VTP.

Big network good for consistency and
easier to make changes.
Server switches need lots of flash memory,
clients do not.
Redundancy dont have everything on one
server switch.
Problems from large domains.
Extreme care when adding a switch.
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Why transparent?
Put

a switch in transparent mode if it has

local VLANs that are not on other switches.
The other switches do not need to know
about them.

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Witney College

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VTP pruning
Disabled

by default
Enable it on one server in domain.
Stops VLAN traffic from being sent on links
that do not lead to devices on that VLAN.
Cuts down on traffic on trunk links.

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Witney College

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Domain names and passwords

Configure

a domain name on the first server

switch. The other switches will learn it.
If you configure it on other switches, check
that it is exactly the same. It is case sensitive.
If you use a password then it must be exactly
the same on all switches.

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Witney College

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Versions
VTP

version 1 is used by default on Catalyst

switches, but they can use version 2.
If you configure version 2 on one switch then
the other switches should learn the new
version and change to it.
If a switch is not capable of running version 2
then it will not exchange advertisements.

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Configure VTP
Configure

VTP with a domain name before

creating VLANs on the server.
Existing VLANs are removed when you start
to configure VTP.
Check that links are trunk links.
Configure client switches to client mode.

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Commands on server
SW1(config)#vtp

domain cisco1
SW1(config)#vtp password cisco
(Password is optional)
Server mode is default, but if it was changed:
SW1(config)#vtp mode server
Version 1 is default, but command is:
SW1(config)#vtp version 1
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Commands on server
Create

VLANs
Check that link is a trunk.
Check VTP operation
SW1# show vtp status
Assign switch ports to VLANs.

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Witney College

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Client configuration
SW2(config)#vtp

mode client

Check

that link is a trunk.

Check VTP operation
SW2# show vtp status
Assign switch ports to VLANs.

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Witney College

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Things to check

VTP Version. It needs to be the same on all

switches in the domain.
Domain name. Is it exactly the same on all
switches?
VTP Password if any. Is it exactly the same on all
switches?
Check that there is at least one server. Better to
have at least two.
If you recently added a new switch, had its revision
number been set to 0?

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Witney College

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The End

13 May 2015

S Ward Abingdon and Witney College

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