WEBVTT

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 Hello and welcome to this video titled,
 What is a Wireless Architecture?

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 So here are the topics we're
 going to cover in this video.

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 I'm going to describe what
 is a wireless architecture.

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 I'm going to define that term for you
 so it becomes familiar and then

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 we're going to look at some high
-level architectural differences.

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 So let's start with a question.

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 What do we mean by a wireless
 architecture?

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 What does that term actually mean?


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 Well, as this slide says here, wireless
 lands can be designed using a

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 variety of devices and in a
 variety of configurations.

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 At an absolute minimum, you have to have
 a wireless client like your laptop,

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 PC, smartphone or tablet
 and an access point.

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 That's the absolute minimum configuration
 for a wireless architecture.

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 But in Cisco's world, we want to get
 away from that and introduce even

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 more complexity by having a controller
 in the environment as well that

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 controls the access point.

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 And when you introduce that, that involves
 a whole bunch of permutations

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 that we call architectures.

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 So these configurations and designs are
 what we call wireless architectures

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 and we're going to look at the
 different types of these.

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 So what are some of the wireless architectures
 we'll be discussing?

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 We'll talk about autonomous architectures,
 their pros and their cons.

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 We'll talk about cloud-based architectures,
 converged architectures, mesh

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 architectures and centralized
 wireless architectures.

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 All right, so let's go into a
 little bit more detail here.

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 What are some of the high level
 differences between these?

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 So all of these architectures fall into
 one of two categories that we'll

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 be discussing. Either they are distributed
 architectures or they are centralized

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 architectures. Now, these terms can
 mean different things depending on

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 who you're talking to.

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 For example, some people think of a
 distributed architecture meaning,

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 okay, we just have five or ten or 500
 access points in our organization,

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 but each one is operating totally independently
 of all the other ones.

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 In other words, they are standalone
 or autonomous access points.

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 So when you introduce a new access
 point, you have to log on to it and

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 configure it yourself manually.

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 So we can say in that situation that
 that's a distributed architecture

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 because the logic or intelligence that's
 controlling your wireless LANs

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 is distributed among all these
 independent access points.

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 But another way of looking at this
 is, well, if we're going to have a

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 wireless LAN controller that's going
 to reach out and control all those

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 access points, all right, well, we can
 still have the concept of distributed

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 and centralized architectures even with
 that because when you introduce

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 a controller, you could have
 lots of controllers.

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 So we could think of a distributed architecture
 as being many controllers,

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 either physical boxes sort of spread
 out among my enterprise or campus,

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 each one controlling a subset
 of access points.

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 That could be considered
 distributed.

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 Or we could say, hey, let's move the
 controller right down into the switch

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 itself. Let's give the switch that's
 physically connected to the access

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 point, the ability to be a controller
 inside the switch.

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 That would be another example
 of a distributed architecture.

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 However, a centralized architecture
 pretty much always means the same

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 thing. That you have one or maybe two
 controllers in a central location

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 like a data center and all your access
 points are connecting to that and

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 being managed by that.

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 So we're going to see the various architectures
 we're going to talk about

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 and they're going to fall into some
 of those different categories.

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 So what are some common questions that
 need to be answered when we're

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 dealing with any of
 these architectures?

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 So how you answer these questions will
 determine which architecture is

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 most appropriate for you.

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 Well, number one, where's the management
 of the access points originated?

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 Are the access points
 managing themselves?

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 Is management and control those access
 points coming from a switch they're

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 directly connected to or from some controller
 appliance much, much further

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 away? That will dictate what type
 of architecture that you use.

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 Number two. Do the access points have
 a functional GUI or command line

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 for management? Number three, who performs
 authentication of Wi-Fi clients?

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 Do we want the access point to do that
 or do we want to offload that to

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 a controller somewhere?

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 And number four, what is the actual
 path of user data as it leaves the

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 Wi-Fi domain and enters
 the distribution system?

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 So that covers this real high-level
 overview of what is a wireless LAN

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 architecture. And thank you very
 much for watching this video.