Catalyst 4500 Series Switch Software Configuration Guide, IOS XE 3.9.xE and IOS 15.2(5)Ex

Obtaining Smart Call Home

If you have a service contract directly with Cisco Systems, you can register your devices for the Smart Call Home service. Smart Call Home provides fast resolution of system problems by analyzing Call Home messages sent from your devices and providing background information and recommendations. For issues that can be identified as known, particularly GOLD diagnostics failures, Automatic Service Requests will be generated with the Cisco TAC.

Smart Call Home offers the following features:

• Boot-up diagnostics alerts for line cards and supervisor engines in the chassis.
• Analysis of Call Home messages from your device, and where appropriate Automatic Service Request generation, routed to the appropriate TAC team, including detailed diagnostic information to speed problem resolution.
• Secure message transport directly from your device or through a downloadable Transport Gateway (TG) aggregation point. You can use a TG aggregation point in cases requiring support for multiple devices or in cases where security requirements mandate that your devices may not be connected directly to the Internet.
• Web-based access to Call Home messages and recommendations, inventory and configuration information for all Call Home devices. Provides access to associated field notices, Security Advisories, and End-of-Life information.

You need to register the following items:

• The SMARTnet contract number for your switch
• Your e-mail address
• Your Cisco.com ID

For detailed information on Smart Call Home, refer to the Smart Call Home page at this URL:

http://supportforums.cisco.com/community/netpro/solutions/smart_services/smartcallhome

Configuring Contact Information

Each switch must include a contact e-mail address. You can optionally include a phone number, street address, contract ID, customer ID, and site ID.

To assign the contact information, perform this task:

This example shows the configuration of contact information:

Switch(config)# call-home

Switch(cfg-call-home)# contact-email-addr username@example.com

Switch(cfg-call-home)# phone-number +1-800-555-4567

Switch(cfg-call-home)# street-address “1234 Picaboo Street, Any city, Any state, 12345”

Switch(cfg-call-home)# customer-id Customer1234

Switch(cfg-call-home)# site-id Site1ManhattanNY

Switch(cfg-call-home)# contract-id Company1234

Switch(cfg-call-home)# exit

Switch(config)#

Configuring Destination Profiles

A destination profile contains the required delivery information for an alert notification. At least one destination profile is required. You can configure multiple destination profiles of one or more types.

You can use the predefined destination profile or define a desired profile. If you define a new destination profile, you must assign a profile name.

Note If you use the Cisco Smart Call Home service, the destination profile must use the XML message format.

You can configure the following attributes for a destination profile:

• Profile name—A string that uniquely identifies each user-defined destination profile. The profile name is limited to 31 characters and is not case-sensitive. You cannot use all as a profile name.
• Transport method—The transport mechanism, either e-mail or HTTP (including HTTPS), for delivery of alerts.

– For user-defined destination profiles, e-mail is the default, and you can enable either or both transport mechanisms. If you disable both methods, e-mail will be enabled.

– For the predefined Cisco TAC profile, you can enable either transport mechanism, but not both.

• Destination address—The actual address related to the transport method to which the alert should be sent.
• Message formatting—The message format used for sending the alert.

– For user-defined destination profiles, the format options are long-text, short-text, or XML. The default is XML.

– For the predefined Cisco TAC profile, only XML is allowed.

• Message size—The maximum destination message size. The valid range is 50 to 3,145,728 bytes and the default is 3,145,728 bytes.

To create and configure a destination profile, perform this task:

Copying a Destination Profile

To create a new destination profile by copying an existing profile, perform this task:

Subscribing to Alert Groups

An alert group is a predefined subset of Call Home alerts supported on the switch. Different types of Call Home alerts are grouped into different alert groups depending on their type. These alert groups are available:

• Configuration
• Diagnostic
• Environment
• Inventory
• Syslog

The triggering events for each alert group are listed in the “Alert Group Trigger Events and Commands” section, and the contents of the alert group messages are listed in the “Message Contents” section.

You can select one or more alert groups to be received by a destination profile.

Note A Call Home alert is only sent to destination profiles that have subscribed to the alert group containing that Call Home alert. In addition, the alert group must be enabled.

To subscribe a destination profile to an alert group, perform this task:

Configuring Periodic Notification

When you subscribe a destination profile to either the Configuration or the Inventory alert group, you can choose to receive the alert group messages asynchronously or periodically at a specified time. The sending period can be one of the following:

• Daily—Specify the time of day to send, using an hour:minute format hh:mm, with a 24-hour clock (for example, 14:30).
• Weekly—Specify the day of the week and time of day in the format day hh:mm, where the day of the week is spelled out (for example, monday).
• Monthly—Specify the numeric date, from 1 to 31, and the time of day, in the format date hh:mm.

Configuring Message Severity Threshold

When you subscribe a destination profile to the Diagnostic, Environment, or Syslog alert group, you can set a threshold for sending alert group messages based on the message’s level of severity. Any message with a value lower than the threshold is not sent to the destination.

The severity threshold is configured using the keywords in Table 77-1 , and ranges from catastrophic (level 9, highest level of urgency) to debugging (level 0, lowest level of urgency). If no severity threshold is configured, the default is normal (level 1).

Note Call Home severity levels differ from the system message logging severity levels.

Configuring Syslog Pattern Matching

When you subscribe a destination profile to the Syslog alert group, you can optionally specify a text pattern to be matched within each syslog message. If you configure a pattern, a Syslog alert group message will be sent only if it contains the specified pattern and meets the severity threshold. If the pattern contains spaces, you must enclose it in quotes (“”) when configuring it. You can specify up to five patterns for each destination profile.

Configuring General E-Mail Options

To use the e-mail message transport, you must configure at least one Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) e-mail server address. You can configure the from and reply-to e-mail addresses, and you can specify up to four backup e-mail servers. You can also set a rate limit on e-mail or HTTP messages.

Starting with Cisco IOS Release 15.0(2)SG, you can configure the vrf and source interface or source IP address to send the e-mail messages. If you want to configure similar options to send http messages, you must enter the ip http client source-interface interface-name command where the source-interface can be associated with the vrf you want to set.

To configure general e-mail options, perform this task:

The following notes apply when configuring general e-mail options:

• Backup e-mail servers can be defined by repeating the mail-server command using different priority numbers.
• The mail-server priority number parameter can be configured from 1 to 100. The server with the highest priority (lowest priority number) will be tried first.

This example shows the configuration of general e-mail parameters, including a primary and secondary e-mail server:

Switch(config)# call-home

Switch(cfg-call-home)# mail-server smtp.example.com priority 1

Switch(cfg-call-home)# mail-server 192.168.0.1 priority 2

Switch(cfg-call-home)# sender from username@example.com

Switch(cfg-call-home)# sender reply-to username@example.com

Switch(cfg-call-home)# exit

Switch(config)#

Enabling Call Home

To enable or disable the Call Home feature, perform this task:

Testing Call Home Communications

You can test Call Home communications by sending messages manually using two command types.

• To send a user-defined Call Home test message, use the call-home test command.
• To send a specific alert group message, use the call-home send command.

Sending a Call Home Test Message Manually

To manually send a Call Home test message, perform this task:

This example shows how to manually send a Call Home test message:

Sending a Call Home Alert Group Message Manually

To manually trigger a Call Home alert group message, perform this task:

When manually sending Call Home alert group messages, note the following guidelines:

• You can only manually send the configuration, diagnostic, and inventory alert groups.
• When you manually trigger a configuration, diagnostic, or inventory alert group message and you specify a destination profile name, a message is sent to the destination profile regardless of the profile’s active status, subscription status, or severity setting.
• When you manually trigger a configuration or inventory alert group message and do not specify a destination profile name, a message is sent to all active profiles that have either a normal or periodic subscription to the specified alert group.
• When you manually trigger a diagnostic alert group message and do not specify a destination profile name, the command will cause the following actions:

– For any active profile that subscribes to diagnostic events with a severity level of less than minor, a message is sent regardless of whether the module or interface has observed a diagnostic event.

– For any active profile that subscribes to diagnostic events with a severity level of minor or higher, a message is sent only if the specified module or interface has observed a diagnostic event of at least the subscribed severity level; otherwise, no diagnostic message is sent to the destination profile.

This example shows how to send the configuration alert-group message to the destination profile:

This example shows how to send the diagnostic alert-group message to the destination profile for a specific module, slot/subslot, or slot/bay number.

This example shows how to send the diagnostic alert-group message to all destination profiles for a specific module, slot/subslot, or slot/bay number.

This example shows how to send the inventory call-home message:

Sending a Request for an Analysis and Report

You can use the call-home request command to submit information about your system to Cisco in order to receive helpful information specific to your system. You can request a variety of reports, including security alerts, known bugs, best practices, and command references.

To submit a request for report and analysis information from the Cisco Output Interpreter tool, perform one of these tasks:

When manually sending a Call Home report and analysis request, note the following guidelines:

• If you specify a profile name value, the request is sent to the profile. If you do not specify a profile name, the request is sent to the Cisco TAC profile. The recipient profile does not need to be enabled for the Call Home request. The profile should specify the e-mail address where the transport gateway is configured so that the request message can be forwarded to the Cisco TAC and you can receive the reply from the Smart Call Home service.
• The ccoid user-id value is the registered identifier of the Smart Call Home user. If you specify a user-id, the response is sent to the e-mail address of the registered user. If do not specify a user-id, the response is sent to the contact e-mail address of the device.
• Based on the keyword specifying the type of report requested, the following information is returned:

– config-sanity —Information on best practices as related to the current running configuration

– bugs-list —Known bugs in the running version and in the currently applied features

– command-reference —Reference links to all commands in the running configuration

– product-advisory —Product Security Incident Response Team (PSIRT) notices, End of Life (EOL) or End of Sales (EOS) notices, or field notices (FN) that may affect devices in your network

This example shows a request for analysis of a user-specified show command:

Sending the Output of a Command

You can use the call-home send command to execute a CLI command and e-mail the command output to Cisco or to an e-mail address that you specify.

To execute a CLI command and e-mail the command output, perform this task:

When sending the output of a command, note the following guidelines:

• The specified CLI command can be any run command, including commands for all modules. The command must be contained in quotes (“”).
• If an e-mail address is specified, the command output will be sent to that address. If no e-mail address is specified, the output will be sent to the Cisco TAC (attach@cisco.com). The e-mail will be sent in long text format with the service number, if specified, in the subject line.
• The service number is required only if no e-mail address is specified, or if a Cisco TAC e-mail address is specified.

This example shows how to send the output of a CLI command to a user-specified e-mail address:

Switch# call-home send "show diagnostic result module all" email support@example.com

Configuring and Enabling Smart Call Home

For application and configuration information of the Cisco Smart Call Home service, see the “FastStart” section of the Smart Call Home User Guide at this location:

http://www.cisco.com/go/smartcall/

The user guide includes configuration examples for sending Smart Call Home messages directly from your device or through a transport gateway (TG) aggregation point. You can use a TG aggregation point in cases requiring support for multiple devices or in cases where security requirements mandate that your devices may not be connected directly to the Internet.

Because the Smart Call Home service uses HTTPS as the transport method, you must also configure its CA as a trustpoint, as described in the Smart Call Home User Guide.

Syslog Alert Notification in Long-Text Format Example

Syslog Alert Notification in XML Format Example