Part of managing a BIG-IP^® system involves configuring and maintaining a certain set of system properties. These properties consist of general platform properties, such as the BIG-IP system host name, IP address, and passwords for its system administrative accounts.

You can configure these general properties for the BIG-IP^® system platform:

The management port and TMM

The BIG-IP system has a management port to handle administrative traffic, and TMM switch interfaces to handle application traffic. TMM switch interfaces are those interfaces controlled by the Traffic Management Microkernel (TMM) service.

Management port configuration

By default, DHCP is disabled for the management port on the BIG-IP system. When enabled, DHCP uses UDP ports 67 and 68. On the first boot, the BIG-IP system contacts your DHCP server and obtains a lease for an IP address and default route for the management port, and DNS and NTP servers. You must then configure other system attributes, such as host name and domain name servers. When DHCP is disabled, you manually configure the management port by assigning an IP address and netmask to the port. The IP address that you assign to the management port must be on a different network than the self IP addresses that you assign to VLANs. You can use either an IPv4 or an IPv6 address for the management port. Additionally, if you intend to manage the BIG-IP system from a node on a different subnet of your network, you can specify an IP address for the BIG-IP system to use as a default route to the management port.

Note: If you do not have a DHCP server on your network, the BIG-IP system assigns a default IP address of 192.168.1.245 to the management port of appliances and virtual systems, and 192.186.1.246 to the management port of VIPRION^® systems.

Host name

Every BIG-IP system must have a host name that is a fully qualified domain name (FQDN). An example of a host name is bigip-02.win.net.

Host IP address

Every BIG-IP system must have a host IP address. This IP address can be the same as the address that you used for the management port, or you can assign a unique address. The default value on the screen for this setting is Use Management Port IP Address.

Time zone

Another of the general platform properties that you can specify is the time zone. The many time zones that you can choose from are grouped into these categories: Africa, America, Antarctica, Arctic, Asia, Atlantic, Australia, Europe, Indian, and Pacific. You should specify the time zone region that most closely represents the location of the BIG-IP system you are configuring.

A BIG-IP^® system is typically part of a device group that synchronizes configuration data across two or more BIG-IP devices and provides high availability (failover and connection mirroring).

To ensure that this operates successfully, you assign a device group (to the root folder) to which you want to synchronize configuration data. All folders and sub-folders in the folder hierarchy inherit this device group as a folder attribute.

You also assign a floating traffic group to the root folder. All folders and sub-folders in the folder hierarchy inherit this traffic group as a folder attribute.

Part of managing platform-related properties is maintaining passwords for the system account. You can also configure the system to allow certain IP addresses to access the BIG-IP^® system through SSH.

When you ran the Setup utility on the BIG-IP^® system, you set up some administrative accounts. Specifically, you set up the root and admin accounts. The root and admin accounts are for use by BIG-IP system administrators.

Users logging in with the root account have terminal and browser access to the BIG-IP system. By default, users logging in with the admin account have browser-only access to the BIG-IP system. You can use the general screen for platform properties to change the passwords for root and admin accounts on a regular basis. To change a password, locate the Root Account or Admin Account setting, and in the Password field, type a new password. In the Confirm field, re-type the same password.

When you configure SSH access, you enable user access to the BIG-IP^® system through SSH. Also, only the IP addresses that you specify are allowed access to the system using SSH.

1. On the Main tab, click System > Platform .
   The Platform screen opens.
2. Configure the management port:
   1. In the General Properties area, for the Management Port Configuration setting, select either Automatic (DHCP) or Manual.
3. In the Redundant Device Properties area, for the Root Folder Traffic Group setting, select a device group to which you want to synchronize configuration data.
4. Configure the root and admin account passwords:
   1. In the User Administration area, for the Root Account setting, type a new password in the Password field and re-type the new password in the Confirm field.
   2. For the Admin Account setting, type a new password in the Password field and re-type the new password in the Confirm field.
5. Configure SSH access to the BIG-IP system:
   1. In the User Administration area, select the Enabled check box for the SSH Access setting.
   2. For the SSH IP Allow setting, select either * All Addresses or Specify Range, which enables you to specify a range of addresses for which access is allowed.
6. Click Update.