@R1D2 

ok, but why TP-Link offer this FW Update in a OC200 Environment when this is not compatible with OC200??? We have hundreds of EAP Access Points with a lot of customers! Should we now go to the customers and reset all the stuff and make a downgrade? This costs tonns of hours. Who pay this? This is an TP Link issue! There must be a solution from TP Link to resolve this without resetting all the environments.

IMPO, if Omada Controller is managing the upgrade and config process of EAPs, then it should check that the firmware released, EAP and Controller version are compatible and then only offer the update to users. Many users and administrators trust the equipment manufacturer to release well tested formal updates, without necessarily going through each & every bullet item listed on bugs resolved (not all are in many cases, especially internal QA team generated) and new features implemented, so that security loopholes get progressively eliminated in the lifecycle AND stability improves. generally this type of thing is basic cyber-security practice. These controller offered firmware updates, IMO,  are not devel/debug type releases (which warns people to expect and resolve issues and therefore is better to be offered using manual channels) but production releases and they should even consider backward compatibility of working with OC200 as well as Windows/Linux Controller, if supporting a new type of Controller in near future. So atleast I was not expecting part of the system functionality to conk out while doing the upgrade.

I observed that our EAP225s are still connected to controller, I can view their config, change IP, name, create new SSID etc using the Cloud Remote management interface. Just not display dynamic data like usage statistics. So maybe controller - AP link is not entirely dead.

We can do manual downgrade, but we can't do from Cloud Remote managment interfrace. Have to login to Omada App server machine (or OC200 device) directly and then probbaly use the *Bulk manual upgrade feature (50 EAP225s in our case) to flash the old firmware back, in which case the controller tool *may again offer the malfunctioning firmware update once the flash and reboot with old firmware is completed, unless tplink stops this offer.  All this however IMPO is only a fallback option. Atleast I can live with no-statistics support for a month, provided Tplink offers an upgrade path frrom existing non SDN linux controller to the new SDN Controller. Though absence of usage statistics does impact a bit of system maintainability and operational work. Better is fix the fault.

R1D2 wrote

 

APRC-P3-Tel wrote

Looks like the fault is limited to trhe display of client and user statistics in our case. The networking is working fine (clients are able to use the WLAN, get IP addresses, access internet, etc). Fault possibly something related with dynamic data storage/exchange between AP <--> ApplicationServer <--> Mongo DB.

 

No. The fault is that Omada Controller cannot manage the EAPs anymore. Of course the EAPs still work, but the link between EAP and Omada Controller is dead.

 

maybe another quick update for either Omada Controller or EAP225 is required to fix the fault.

 

Again, no. This firmware implements Omada SDN Controller which is a completely new product with new protocols, new functions, new user interface.

 

This means that you will need to downgrade each EAP manually through the built-in web UI if you want to manage the EAP in the classic Omada Controller, no matter which (classic) controller version you use. Or wait until SDN Controller comes out (next month).

@R1D2 

@R1D2 

Thanks for your Feedback. Fortunately not all APs and Costumers are affected. So we also have not upraded all APs and in the past we never had such issues regarding FW Upgrades with TP-Link stuff. Usually we make this as you wrote -> FW available -> waiting -> testing -> rollout. But not yesterday! Our fault! 

We try to make the downgrade directly over OC200 Controller and hope this will restore all functions.

Thank you

Hi @R1D2,

"Agreed. We should file a feature request to TP-Link."

As part of this feature request re: firmware / controller validation check, it would be realy nice if Omada / OC-200 could show us the changelog / release notes for the new version of EAP firmware prior to upgrading.

Usually this isn't available until the firmware hits the support website a few days laters.  It's nice that OC-200 gets it first, but it's obviously a huge risk to upgrade without any information as to what is actually changing.

Certainly, limited testing prior to roll out it prudent.  But even the best of us get burned sometimes with vendors we trust -- e.g. I generally assume that updates from Apple for iOS / Apps are stable and reliable.  Certainly this is not always the case, but usually my "OCD" gets the best of me (-:

-Jonathan