5400 Series Autorun feature

[Arran Cudbard-Bell]

Hi,

Does anyone have an example of the contents for an autorun USB key for the 5400 series ? If so could they post it.

We don't use PCM+ and the manual doesn't contain any examples.

I'm actually rather annoyed about this, I mean we paid for he hardware. Then we need to buy PCM+ to use some of the advanced management features of the switch ?! I thought HP was all about open standards and transparency.

Thanks,
Arran

[Matt Hobbs]

This manual shows how the feature works with PCM 2.3:

http://cdn.procurve.com/training/Manuals/PCM-AdminGuide59908850-0208.pdf

It's a fairly complex feature which is my guess as to why PCM+ is required to use the feature. (More to the point, it would take considerable time and effort to do the same thing with freeware tools, a lot like other features of PCM+. Some people are glad to pay for something that just works and saves them time).

You could always evaluate it with the 30 day PCM+ trial, and see what it puts on the USB stick to try and understand its inner workings.

[Arran Cudbard-Bell]

"It's a fairly complex feature which is my
guess as to why PCM+ is required to use the feature"

No it's a simple feature, implemented in a complex way, there's a difference.

"(More to the point, it would take considerable time and effort to do the same thing with freeware tools, a lot like other features of PCM+."

We wrote out own commandline toolkit to push out switch configurations, update firmware and backup config files periodically.

PCM would be usefull only as a monitoring tool.

"Some people are glad to pay for something that just works and saves them time)."

We'd gladly purchase PCM+, we have around 625 ProCurve switches on our network, so it'd really save us time and effort...

Unfortunately:

a) It runs on Windows and were a Mac Only department.

b) It's clunky and unreliable.

With ProCurve: features are excellent, hardwares reliable, softwares a little buggy but ok, CLI interface is pretty much spot on, GUI interfaces... are appaling; every time I use the Java interface on the WESMzl I get the uncontrollable urge to rip the module out and stamp on it repeatedly.

Sorry for the rant but this is something that really annoys me, not because of how poor the GUI interfaces are, but how it lets the products down.

Anyway I'll go install the PCM trial, lets hope it works ok in parallels :)

Thanks,
Arran

[Matt Hobbs]

It's more complex when you utilise the certificates and encryption options, but without them I see your point. Still, XML isn't for everyone. Suspect you'll need to reverse engineer this one for now.

[Arran Cudbard-Bell]

Yeah not much of an overlap between network engineers and web designers :)

I've put in a request to support for the XSD's, we'll see what happens.