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Manual Chapter : Managing a BIG-IQ System

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Managing a BIG-IQ System

BIG-IQ navigation overview

F5® BIG-IQ® Centralized Management includes navigation, search tools, and a customizable user interface to help you complete your tasks efficiently and find objects easily.

  • Customized interactions with System and Network Security views There are a few customizable viewing options for the System and Network Security views. You can specify the amount of time that passes before BIG-IQ logs you out when the system is idle and what screen displays when you log back in. If you're using the Network Security service, you can specify what types of firewalls are displayed in the menu, have rule lists in policies auto expand, treat terms you search for as a filter, and specify default values for columns.
  • Global search, related content, and preview pane

    BIG-IQ has a robust and interactive global search feature that allows you to easily find a specific content and related content. From any screen, you can click the magnifying glass icon in the upper-right corner of the screen and type a search string. Search results are grouped by content type. From the results, you can click an object to go directly to that object's properties screen in BIG-IQ.

  • Flexible access to objects and configuration options

    For some objects, you can view and edit settings that are located in other places in the user interface, without having to stop what you're doing and navigate to another part of BIG-IQ. For example, you could be editing a firewall policy and find an address list in the toolbox that you want to look at. Right there, you can click the address to access the details, and then view or edit it as you want.

    You can also configure some types of objects from different places in BIG-IQ, depending on what your user role is or what work flow you're in. For example, you can create an access group from the Configuration area of BIG-IQ, as well as from the Devices area. This makes it convenient for you to access during other tasks you're doing in different areas of BIG-IQ.

  • Filters

    For each screen that contains a list, you can use a context-sensitive filter to search on a term, and then narrow your search further to view only those items that are relevant to you at the moment. For example, say you wanted to see local traffic and network audit logs. You can use the search on local traffic, and further refine what is displayed by filtering again on network audit logs.

  • Customization and sorting columns

    You can customize the columns that display in each screen that has a list, hiding any information that isn't important to you, as well as rearrange the order the columns display, and sort objects in the list. This helps you to focus on only those attributes that are relevant to you.

BIG-IQ Centralized Management documentation set

BIG-IQ Centralized Management documentation set is located on AskF5 at https://support.f5.com. Click the Product Manuals link under Resources, and select BIG-IQ Centralized Management from the product list, and select the appropriate version.

Title Use to:
F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management Virtual Editions Setup guides Set up BIG-IQ Virtual Edition (VE) as a guest in a virtual environment using supported hypervisors.
Planning and Implementing an F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management Deployment Plan deployment, license, and set up the BIG-IQ system in your network.
F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management: Core Concepts Find out more about the concepts about the core functionality included with BIG-IQ Centralized Management.
F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management DCD Sizing Guide Determine the resources that are required to handle the data generated by the BIG-IP® devices you manage. Requirements vary according to the type and amount of data you generate.
F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management: Authentication, Roles, and User Management
  • Configure authentication through a 3rd-party provider (LDAP, RADIUS or TACAS+) .
  • Use built-in and custom roles to manage user access.
F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management: Monitoring and Reports
  • Set up health monitoring and alerts and statistics collections
  • Manage audit logs, run reports, and analyze statistics.
  • Troubleshoot Access reports.
F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management: Device
  • Discover BIG-IP devices and import F5 services.
  • Deploy software images, licenses, SSL certificates, backup files, and configurations.
F5 BIG-IQ Local Traffic & Network Implementations Manage:
  • Local Traffic profiles
  • Virtual servers
  • Network objects
  • iRules
  • Applications and application templates
As well as configuring an IPsec tunnel and event viewing.
F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management: Security

Manage:

  • Object pinning
  • Firewall contexts
  • Address and port lists
  • Rules, rule lists, policies, and rule reports
  • Service, timer, and port misuse policies
  • NAT policies and translations
  • FQDN resolvers
  • Change verifications
  • External logging devices
  • Shared security for virtual servers, DoS profiles, device DoS configurations, network whitelists, logging profiles, and SSH profiles
  • Bot signatures and bot signature categories
  • IP intelligence settings
  • External redirection settings
  • Application Securities Policies
  • Signature files, custom attack signatures and sets
  • Web Application Security event logs
F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management: Access
  • Configure an Access group, HA pair, and cluster.
  • Manage access groups.
  • View and edit access configurations.
  • Configure authentication for Active Directory, SecuID, HTTP, Oracle Access Manager, OCSP responder, CRLDP, and Kerberos.
  • Manage audit logs
F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management: Fraud Protection Service Set up, manage, and monitor alerts for fraud protection.
F5 Platform Guide: BIG-IQ 7000 Series Set up and manage the BIG-IQ 7000 hardware platform.
F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management Use Case: Provide Role-Based User Access to an Application Give role-based user access to a SharePoint application.
F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management: Auto-Scale in a VMware Cloud Start auto-scaling BIG-IP VE devices in a VMware cloud to manage applications.
F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management: Auto-Scale in a AWS Cloud Start auto-scaling BIG-IP VE devices in an AWS cloud to manage applications.
BIG-IQ Centralized Management: Monitoring and Managing Application Services Monitor the health and statistics for your application services.
F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management upgrade guides Upgrade BIG-IQ Centralized Management and BIG-IQ Logging Node to the most recent software version.
Release notes Find information about the current software release, including a list of associated documentation, a summary of new features, enhancements, fixes, known issues, and available workarounds.
AskF5 Articles and Tech Notes Read responses and resolutions to known issues. Tech Notes provide additional configuration instructions and how-to information.

Use global search to access associated objects from any screen

BIG-IQ Centralized Management makes it easy for you to perform a search for specific details of your configuration across all your managed devices. From the content that is returned, you can access everything associated with that content, regardless of where it is on BIG-IQ. For example, if you search on a specific self-IP address, the results give you access to other content related to that self-IP address. We call this global search.

Global search is a powerful feature that gives you quick access to all objects that contain a certain string. This can give you insight about how objects are relate, even when they're running different services, devices, and so forth.

Important: BIG-IQ global search returns only the content specific to your user role privileges. For example, if your user role doesn't have privileges for content associated with security, content specific only to security does not display.
  1. On any screen, click the icon in the upper right corner.
    The global search popup screen opens.
  2. Into the search field, type all or part of a string you want to search for.
  3. If you want to specify search options, click the arrow next to the search field and select the options you want and click the Enter key.
    The screen refreshes to display content associated with your search term, organized by type.
  4. Click the object link to view the details for an object.
    Tip: You can navigate back to the results after you click on an object, by clicking the magnifying glass on upper right side of the screen again.
  5. If you want to clear the search results, click the X next to the BIG-IQ Search field of the popup window.

Filter an object list

For each screen that contains an object list, you can narrow the list to display only specific items, phrases, or numbers. This helps you easily navigate long lists and find what you need quickly.
  1. Navigate to a screen that contains a list of objects.
    For example, Devices > BIG-IP DEVICES .
  2. In the Filter field located towards the top of the screen, type a term, phrase, or number, and press the Enter key.
    Tip: By default, BIG-IQ uses this filter on anything that matches any field on the screen, so this can be a partial term, phrase or number. For example, if you wanted to see only objects that contained the number 191, you'd type 191.
    Tip: To limit the filter to a specific object type, click the down arrow next to the search field and select the type of object you're looking for. To require the term match exactly, click Exact.
    The screen refreshes to display only those items that include or exactly match the term you used for a filter. The filter you used displays at the top of the list.
  3. To further limit the results displayed, type another term in the Filter field, selecting options from the filter menu as you did before.
  4. To view the properties of an object, click the object's name.
    Tip: Click the back button to return to the filter results.
  5. To remove a filter, at the top of the list, click the X next to a filter.

Set preferences for BIG-IQ user interface

Only after you license and finish the initial setup for BIG-IQ Centralized Management, can you specify a few preferences for the user interface.
Setting user preferences customizes your view into BIG-IQ.
Note: The navigation objects and screens you see depend on your user role.
  1. At the top of the screen, click System.
  2. On the left, click USER PREFERENCES towards the bottom of the screen.
  3. You can edit the user preferences for the overall BIG-IQ system by clicking the Edit button.
  4. Click Network Security and the Edit button to edit preferences for the Security service.
Click the icon at the top right of the screen for more information about these options.

How do I manage BIG-IQ systems in a high availability configuration?

Setting up BIG-IQ®in a high availability configuration ensures that you always have access to the BIG-IP® devices you are managing. In a BIG-IQ high availability configuration, the BIG-IQ system replicates configuration changes since the last synchronization from the primary device to the secondary device every 30 seconds. If it ever becomes necessary, you can have the secondary peer take over management of the BIG-IP devices.

Add a peer BIG-IQ system for a high availability configuration

Before you can set up F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management in a high availability (HA) pair, you must have two licensed BIG-IQ systems.

For the high-availability pair to synchronize properly, each system must be running the same BIG-IQ version, and the clocks on each system must be synchronized to within 60 seconds. To make sure the clocks are in sync, take a look at the NTP settings on each system before you add a peer.

Configuring BIG-IQ in a high availability (HA) pair means that you can still manage your BIG-IP devices even if one BIG-IQ systems fails.
  1. At the top of the screen, click System.
  2. On the left, click BIG-IQ HA.
  3. Click the Add Secondary button.
  4. Type the properties for the BIG-IQ system that you are adding.
  5. Click the Add button at the bottom of the screen.
The BIG-IQ system synchronize. Once they are finished, both appear as ready (green).

Change a peer BIG-IQ system in a high availability pair to a standalone system

If the one of your BIG-IQ systems in an HA pair is having any type of system issue, you might want to make its peer system a standalone system until you can fix the problem.

  1. At the top of the screen, click System.
  2. On the left, click BIG-IQ HA.
  3. Click the BIG-IQ HA Settings button and then click the Reset to Standalone button.
This BIG-IQ system becomes a standalone system from which you can start managing your devices.

Remove the secondary BIG-IQ from the HA pair

If the F5 BIG-IQ Centralized Management system is configured in an HA pair, you must remove the secondary BIG-IQ system before you upgrade the primary BIG-IQ.
  1. Log in to the primary BIG-IQ with your admin user name and password.
  2. At the top of the screen, click System.
  3. On the left, click BIG-IQ HA.
  4. Click Remove Secondary.
    A dialog box opens, prompting you to confirm that you want to remove the HA secondary device from this group.
  5. Click Remove to confirm you want to take the HA secondary device out of the group.
    The system logs you out of the BIG-IQ while it removes the secondary device.
  6. Log back in to the primary BIG-IQ with your admin user name and password.
    For a while, both the primary and the secondary BIG-IQ devices continue to display. After a few minutes, the screen updates to display a single standalone device.

Optional VLAN for device management

During the licensing and initial configuration procedures, you specify the management port for BIG-IQ®. This is all the networking configuration required to start managing devices. However, if you would prefer to manage devices from a VLAN address, you have the option to configure that.

Configure a VLAN to manage BIG-IP devices

You must have licensed the BIG-IQ system before you can configure a VLAN.
If you decide you want to manage BIG-IP devices from a VLAN rather than the BIG-IQ system's management port, you can configure it using this procedure.
  1. At the top of the screen, click System.
  2. On the left, click NETWORK SETTINGS > VLANs .
  3. Click the Create button.
  4. In the Name and Description fields, type a unique name and description to identify this new VLAN.
  5. In the Tag field, type an optional tag number.

    A VLAN tag is a unique ID number between 1 and 4094. All messages sent from a host in this VLAN includes the tag as a header in the message to identify the specific VLAN where the source or destination host is located. If you do not assign a tag, BIG-IQ assigns one automatically.

  6. From the Interface list, select the port that you want this VLAN to use.

    The interface is a physical or virtual port that you use to connect the BIG-IQ system to managed devices in your network.

  7. In the MTU field, type an optional frame size value for Path Maximum Transmission Unit (MTU).

    By default, BIG-IP devices use the standard Ethernet frame size of 1518 bytes (1522 bytes if VLAN tagging is used) with the corresponding MTU of 1500 bytes. For BIG-IP devices that support Jumbo Frames, you can specify another MTU value.

  8. Click the Save & Close button.

Specify a self-IP address for a VLAN

You need to configure BIG-IQ with at least a VLAN before you can associate a self IP address with it.
If you've configured a VLAN to manage BIG-IP devices, you can then associate a self IP address with that VLAN.
  1. At the top of the screen, click System.
  2. On the left, click NETWORK SETTINGS > Self IPs .
  3. At the top of the screen, click the Create button.
  4. In the Name field, type a unique name to identify this new self IP address.
  5. In the Address field, type the self IP address and netmask.
    The format is <self IP address/netmask>.
  6. In the Description field, type a description for this self IP address.
  7. From the VLAN list, select the VLAN to associate with this self IP address.
  8. Click the Save & Close button.

Specify a web proxy for secure communication

Before you can specify a web proxy, you must license and perform the initial configuration for BIG-IQ Centralized Management.
For security purposes, you can specify a web proxy for BIG-IQ to use for communication with the F5 iHealth server and the F5 license server.
  1. At the top of the screen, click System.
  2. On the left, click PROXIES.
  3. Near the top of the screen, click the Add button.
  4. In the Name field, type a name to identify this web proxy.
    Important: You must use the exact same proxy name on all BIG-IQ systems in a cluster.
  5. In the Address and Port fields, type the IP address and port for the web proxy server.
    The proxy address and port don't have to be the same for all BIG-IQ systems in a cluster.
  6. If the web proxy server requires authentication, provide the credentials in the User Name and Password fields.
  7. For the Functions setting, select the check box next to each function you want to use this web proxy for communication between BIG-IQ and the internet.
  8. Click the Save & Close button.
BIG-IQ will now use this web proxy for communication when accessing the internet for the functionality you specified.
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