Capsman Master-Slave Configuration

RouterOS Beginner Basics
1

Hi all,

Hope you are doing well.

I have configured CapsMan in MikroTik Switch and AP with local forwarding mode and everything is working fine.

I changed the config to have Master-Slave setup and the following happened:

When I add a virtual WiFi interface to CAP in AP, the physical and virtual interfaces are immediately disabled, and the physical interface of AP disappears in CapsMan.

I checked the logs but no error messages were found.

I need your appreciated help, and thanks in advance.

Attached the config file of each part.
CapsMan.rsc (2.36 KB)
Cap.rsc (1.84 KB)

2

Virtual interfaces cannot be added to capsman.
/interface wireless cap

stopped because not all interfaces available

wlan3 is virtual

set bridge=AP-Bridge caps-man-addresses=10.10.239.1 discovery-interfaces=
ether1 enabled=yes interfaces=wlan1,wlan3
If necessary, everything is configured in capsman

3

Hi Ca6ko,
Sorry for the late reply.

So if I want to do it, could you guide me kindly?

Thanks.

4

It’s been a while since I used CAPsMAN: think you should do all the configuration on the manager site and not on the CAPs site.

5

You will create the additional configuration in CAPsAN to define your virtual interfaces, then from the provision sub-menu you will add the master config and you can also include one or more slave configuration.
In this way CAPsMAN will manage both interfaces, master, slaves and they will appear to your AP.

For more info, you can read here: https://help.mikrotik.com/docs/display/ROS/CAPsMAN

6

This looks an awful lot like the issue I am having here

http://forum.mikrotik.com/t/solved-capsman-multiple-ssids-with-master-slave/162861/1

I’ve ready through the linked CAPsMAN page several times but it is not helping me much. My slave interfaces won’t come up and there must be something wrong in one of my configs (I am 100% GUI right now) but I’ve been through them numerous times and can’t find anything obvious

7

Is it right that I must add every slave interface on every master interface what I have manually? That makes not much sense when I have a centralised manager for WiFi?

8

AFAIK this is only necessary when running wifi-qcom-ac driver AND configuring VLAN’s.

9

But why? This makes the benefit of a centralised management to 0! When I need to configure the other WiFis in different VLANs manually on each CAP interface.
I have a cAP-AC and must do it?

10

Because wifi-qcom**-ac** drivers are missing some crucial functionalities … which were missing also in wifi-qcom but were eventually implemented there. MT keeps acting deaf to our pleads to implement them in wifi-qcom-ac as well.

11

Because wifi-qcom> -ac > drivers are missing some crucial functionalities … which were missing also in wifi-qcom but were eventually implemented there. MT keeps acting deaf to our pleads to implement them in wifi-qcom-ac as well.

Ok, so the hAP ax^2 should working and the cAP-AC also because there the wifi-qcom-ac aren´t used? But I have also problems on the cAP-AC that when I specify slave configurations in the provisioning profile only one of them are applied. Before it works with more and now not anymore? What can be the problem there?

12

cAP ac supports two drivers: wireless and wifi-qcom-ac. If you want to fully integrate and cooperate with the wifi-qcom driver (included with the hAP AX2), you are limited to the latter. And in that case, you have to add virtual interfaces to the cAP ac manually.

Another approach would be using both old and new CAPsMAN, so you can keep using the wireless driver for cAP ac (and manage it through the old CAPsMAN). Only disadvantage is all the functionality (and performance) that the new driver brings is missing.

13

I tried to install the wifi-qcom-ac on the cAP-AC but it doesn´t work or the 5GHz interface which could use the wifi-qcom-ac don´t want to use it. Because under "WiFi" no interfaces is listed. Or is it not listed because both are under CAPsMAN control at this moment? But when I only use the old CAPsMAN I have this problem also that not all slave configs are applied to the AP?

14

Sounds like multiple problems. Did you uninstall the wireless driver prior to installing the wifi-qcom-ac driver? Why are you referring to the 5GHz interface, while both interfaces are missing under WiFi? Interfaces should always be shown on devices with wifi interface.

From the cAP ac, can you post:

/system packages print

For input on the last question (slaves vs old CAPsMAN), can you please post the complete config of the CAPsMAN:

/export file=anynameyoulike

Remove serial and any other private info, post between code tags by using the </> button.

15
  1. Yes, the wireless driver was pre-installed and I didn´t uninstall it.
  2. Because in the MikroTik Documentation is written that only WiFi-5 wave2 and newer are supported by the wifi-qcom-ac (but it is also written that 802.11ac is supported by it?). And I can see the wireless interfaces under "Wireless" but not under "WiFi"
  3. Packages on cAP-AC:
[admin@MikroTik] > /system/package/print
Columns: NAME, VERSION, BUILD-TIME, SIZE
# NAME      VERSION  BUILD-TIME           SIZE
0 wireless  7.18.2   2025-03-11 11:59:04  1924.1KiB
1 routeros  7.18.2   2025-03-11 11:59:04  11.5MiB
  1. CAPsMAN configuration:
/caps-man datapath
add client-to-client-forwarding=yes local-forwarding=yes name=Local-Forwarding
/caps-man security
add authentication-types=wpa2-eap encryption=aes-ccm name=RADIUS
add authentication-types=wpa2-psk encryption=aes-ccm name=PSK
/caps-man configuration
add country=germany datapath=Local-Forwarding datapath.client-to-client-forwarding=yes .local-forwarding=yes mode=ap name=ME-IT-CAPsMAN security=PSK ssid=ME-IT-CAPsMAN
add country=germany datapath=Local-Forwarding datapath.client-to-client-forwarding=yes .local-forwarding=yes .vlan-id=35 .vlan-mode=use-tag mode=ap name=WiFi-OPNsense \security=PSK ssid=WiFi-OPNsense
add country=germany datapath=Local-Forwarding datapath.vlan-id=37 .vlan-mode=use-tag mode=ap name=WiFi-RB5009-LAN security=PSK ssid=RB5009-LAN
/caps-man interface
add configuration=ME-IT-CAPsMAN disabled=no l2mtu=1600 mac-address=48:A9:8A:xx:xx:xx master-interface=none name=CAP-ME-IT1 radio-mac=48:A9:8A:xx:xx:xx radio-name=48A98Axxxxxx
add configuration=WiFi-OPNsense disabled=no l2mtu=1600 mac-address=4A:A9:8A:xx:xx:xx master-interface=CAP-ME-IT1 name=CAP-ME-IT1-1 radio-mac=00:00:00:00:00:00 radio-name=4AA98Axxxxxx
add configuration=ME-IT-CAPsMAN disabled=no l2mtu=1600 mac-address=48:A9:8A:xx:xx:xx master-interface=none name=CAP-ME-IT2 radio-mac=48:A9:8A:xx:xx:xx radio-name=48A98Axxxxxx
add configuration=WiFi-OPNsense disabled=no l2mtu=1600 mac-address=4A:A9:8A:xx:xx:xx master-interface=CAP-ME-IT2 name=CAP-ME-IT2-1 radio-mac=00:00:00:00:00:00 radio-name=4AA98xxxxxx
/caps-man manager
set enabled=yes
/caps-man provisioning
add action=create-dynamic-enabled master-configuration=ME-IT-CAPsMAN name-format=prefix name-prefix=CAP-ME-IT slave-configurations=WiFi-OPNsense

(Why this code isn´t formatted so well how the other code above?) And please note that at the moment I only have one slave configuration.

16

(Why this code isn´t formatted so well how the other code above?)

Sometimes the board parser interprets differently a second block of code, in these cases you need one or two returns (or newlines) between the previous block of code and the following one.

In your case, try adding a return just after:

  1. CAPsMAN configuration:
17

@melectronics, what is your actual question? Can you explain what you are trying to accomplish?

18

I´m trying to setting up a Multi-SSID CAP with (first the old) CAPsMAN on a cAP-AC. But when I´m adding now another slave configuration it will not be applied to the cAP-AC? I don´t understand why because yesterday it works with two slave configurations and today not anymore?

19

It should. Have you checked logging? Did you reset the CAP (just to make sure)? Did you do anything manual on the CAP?
From your CAPsMAN config, I would not expect the /caps-man interface part (but it has been long time since I worked with the old CAPsMAN). Can you remove it and try again?

20

No, I wanted to check logging also yesterday but forgot it :sweat_smile:. I have resetted the CAP yesterday and I have added a bridge on the CAP with the ether1 interface in it because I use local forwarding. The CAP interfaces are created after the provisioning that had worked.

So now I checked the logs. Nothing what can help. But I´m also not sure if the cAP itself is completely ok because I used it before as a WLAN repeater and one morning nothing works anymore. Maybe the hardware is partly not OK... But I only have the hAP-ax2 here and that need the new CAPsMAN :grimacing::grimacing: