F5

This guide covers F5OS platforms (VELOS chassis and rSeries appliances) and BIG-IP systems running TMOS.

F5OS

F5OS is the platform layer on VELOS (F5OS-C) and rSeries (F5OS-A) hardware.

Create a backup account. Create a dedicated netwatch-backup user in the F5OS user management (web UI User Management, or the F5OS CLI). Assign the operator role, which provides read-only access sufficient to display the configuration; use admin only if your release restricts configuration display for operators.

Enable SSH. SSH is the standard management access method on F5OS and is enabled by default on the management interface. If you use allowed-IP lists for management access, add the Netwatch collector's IP address.

Notes. F5OS tenants running TMOS are backed up separately — add each tenant as its own device following the TMOS section below.

TMOS

TMOS runs on BIG-IP appliances, VIPRION chassis, and BIG-IP Virtual Edition.

Create a backup account. Create a dedicated account with access to all partitions and the tmsh shell. The read-only Auditor role can display the configuration:

create auth user netwatch-backup password <password> shell tmsh partition-access add { all-partitions { role auditor } }
save sys config

Use the admin role instead of auditor only if your environment requires it; QUARK never modifies the device either way. Make sure the account's login shell is tmsh, not bash.

Enable SSH. SSH is enabled by default on the management interface. To restrict SSH to the Netwatch collector:

modify sys sshd allow add { <collector-ip> }
save sys config

Notes. QUARK retrieves the running configuration with tmsh show commands. On multi-partition systems the account must have access to all partitions (as configured above) so the full configuration is captured. Remote authentication (RADIUS, TACACS+, LDAP) also works if the resulting session lands in tmsh with at least Auditor rights.

Enable backup in Netwatch

Once the device is prepared, open its host in Netwatch (Data collection > Hosts) and add the Config Backup macros — the supported status flag, the model code for this platform, and the credentials you created. See Getting started for the full macro list and values.