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Onboard and Manage Devices

You can use Paragon Automation to plan, deploy, and monitor your network in both greenfield and brownfield scenarios.
Greenfield deployments involve building a network from the start. In greenfield deployments, you purchase the required number of devices, plan the IP addressing scheme, design network topology, and cable the devices to suit your business requirements.
Brownfield deployments involve provisioning devices that integrate with a legacy network. In brownfield network deployments, you are concerned with scaling up and scaling out devices in your existing network in a fast but efficient manner.

Paragon Automation is a closed-loop automation solution that enables you to automate device provisioning at scale. You can automate device provisioning by using the Add Devices or Discover Devices option in the Paragon Automation GUI.

Paragon Automation supports selected models in the following device series:

  • ACX, MX, and PTX series routers

  • EX and QFX series switches

  • SRX series firewalls

  • Cisco devices

  • Nokia devices

See Supported Devices for all devices and OS versions supported in Paragon Automation.

Tip:

For more information on purchasing a device, go to How to Buy Juniper Network Devices.

After you purchase a device, follow the instructions in the hardware documentation to unbox the device, mount it on a rack, and power on the device. For details about installing a device, see the device's Hardware Guide on the TechLibrary or the device’s Quick Start Guide. Search for the device in the search box provided or click Routing > View More, Switching > View More, or Security > View More and search for the device in the list.
You can onboard devices from Juniper Networks and other vendors using the Discover Devices or the Add Devices (ZTP) option. Use the Discover Devices option to add devices that are already operational in your network (brownfield deployment). Use the Add Devices (ZTP) option to add new devices in your network (greenfield or brownfield deployment). During the device onboarding process, Paragon Automation detects the devices using the IP address or hostname that you provide.
Whether you use the Discover Devices or the Add Devices (ZTP) option to onboard a device, you can mark the management status of devices by using the Management Status field. When the Management Status field is enabled, devices are managed and when the Management Status field is disabled, the devices are unmanaged. Managed devices are those for which Paragon Automation synchronizes the device configuration using NETCONF. Unmanaged devices are those for which Paragon Automation doesn't synchronize the device configuration.

You must ensure that you complete the following device configurations before you add the devices for onboarding:

  • Management IP address

    Note:

    If your Juniper device has more than one Routing Engine, you must configure an additional management IP address (with the master-only statement) that is active only on the primary Routing Engine's interface.

  • Configure NETCONF (on port 22) and SSH maximum inbound sessions on Nokia devices

  • Configure NETCONF and SSH rate limit on Cisco devices

The workflow for onboarding and managing devices in Paragon Automation is as follows:
  1. Onboard the device:
    1. Log in to the Paragon Automation GUI. For more information, see Access the Paragon Automation GUI.
    2. (Optional) Select Configuration > Templates > Configuration Templates to deploy additional configurations such as NTP, Syslog, Aggregated Ethernet device count, SNMP, and so on. See Configuration Templates Workflow for more information.
    3. Select Configuration > Devices.

      The Devices page appears.

    4. Click the Add (+) icon.

      The Devices page appears.

    5. Select one of the following options to onboard devices in Paragon Automation:

      • Discover Devices: Use this option if you want to onboard devices that are operational in your network. When you onboard devices using Discover Devices, Paragon Automation collects and stores details of the devices in the Paragon Automation database. For more information, see Discover Devices.

      • Add New Devices: Use this option if you want to onboard new devices by using zero touch provisioning (ZTP). You must specify device details, such as serial number, device model, and the root password. For more information, see Add New Devices.

        Note:

        If the devices that you want to onboard (by using ZTP) are not in the same subnet as Paragon Automation, you must install and run DHCP Relay to connect the devices with Paragon Automation. See Configure a DHCP Relay for ZTP for more information.
      Paragon Automation triggers a device discovery job and displays a message with a link to the job.
    6. Click the job ID link in the message (or on the Jobs page [Monitoring > Jobs]) to open the Job Status page, where you can monitor the status of the scheduled job.
    7. After the job finishes, go to the Devices page and verify that the devices are added or discovered successfully by checking the current status displayed in the Status field.
    Note:

    • For managed devices, the Management Status should be Up, indicating that Paragon Automation established a connection with the device. In addition, the Sync Status should be In Sync, indicating that the configuration and the inventory data in Paragon Automation and on the device are synchronous.

    • For unmanaged devices, the Management Status should be Unmanaged, and the Sync Status should be Unknown. The Sync Status Unknown indicates that Paragon Automation added the device to its database, but that no NETCONF session was created to synchronize the configuration and the status.
  2. (Optional) After you successfully onboard a device, you can perform the following operations to manage a device:
    Note:

    For an unmanaged device, you can perform only edit and delete operations.

Related Documentation