Solved VTP 3 updates config revision but vlans don't appear

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I have a network of all cisco switches. I have tried to follow your training in configuring VTP version 3 on each switch. It generally seems to be working. However, on one particular switch I see the config revision update with changes to the server but the list of vlans never changes. What might cause this issue? I'm out of ideas.

Thanks

@Kevin-Davis,

We're not sure. We might need some more data. Are you comparing all the switches in the VTP Domain. Can you do a show vtp status and a show vlan brief on this switch that isn't updating as well as another switch?

Here is VTP status on the only VTP server in our network C1.1:

C1.1#show vtp status
VTP Version capable : 1 to 3
VTP version running : 3
VTP Domain Name : ogre
VTP Pruning Mode : Enabled
VTP Traps Generation : Disabled
Device ID : f4ea.67f7.bd80

Feature VLAN:

VTP Operating Mode : Primary Server
Number of existing VLANs : 9
Number of existing extended VLANs : 0
Configuration Revision : 16
Primary ID : f4ea.67f7.bd80
Primary Description : C1.1
MD5 digest : 0x16 0xBC 0xCD 0x1E 0xB8 0x62 0xB4 0xDB
0xEC 0x13 0xDF 0x0F 0xD6 0x30 0x6A 0xFF

Feature MST:

VTP Operating Mode : Transparent

Feature UNKNOWN:

VTP Operating Mode : Transparent

Here is VTP Status on the switch of interest:

E2.128#show vtp status
VTP Version capable : 1 to 3
VTP version running : 3
VTP Domain Name : ogre
VTP Pruning Mode : Enabled
VTP Traps Generation : Disabled
Device ID : 18ef.63b4.c900

Feature VLAN:

VTP Operating Mode : Client
Number of existing VLANs : 6
Number of existing extended VLANs : 0
Configuration Revision : 16
Primary ID : f4ea.67f7.bd80
Primary Description : C1.1
MD5 digest : 0x16 0xBC 0xCD 0x1E 0xB8 0x62 0xB4 0xDB
0xEC 0x13 0xDF 0x0F 0xD6 0x30 0x6A 0xFF

Feature MST:

VTP Operating Mode : Transparent

Feature UNKNOWN:

VTP Operating Mode : Transparent

You'll notice that the revisions match as do the digests.
However, the vlans do not!
Here is are the vlans on the server:

C1.1#show vlan

VLAN Name Status Ports

1 default active Gi0/1, Gi0/26, Gi0/28
100 DATA active Gi0/3, Gi0/5, Gi0/6, Gi0/7
Gi0/8, Gi0/9, Gi0/10, Gi0/11
Gi0/12, Gi0/13, Gi0/14, Gi0/15
Gi0/16, Gi0/17, Gi0/18, Gi0/19
Gi0/20, Gi0/22, Gi0/23, Gi0/24
Gi0/25
101 GUEST active Gi0/2
102 VOICE active Gi0/5, Gi0/6, Gi0/7, Gi0/8
Gi0/9, Gi0/10, Gi0/11, Gi0/12
Gi0/13, Gi0/14, Gi0/15, Gi0/16
Gi0/17, Gi0/18, Gi0/19, Gi0/20
Gi0/21, Gi0/22, Gi0/23, Gi0/24
111 RALPH active
1002 fddi-default act/unsup
1003 trcrf-default act/unsup
1004 fddinet-default act/unsup
1005 trbrf-default act/unsup

VLAN Type SAID MTU Parent RingNo BridgeNo Stp BrdgMode Trans1 Trans2

1 enet 100001 1500 - - - - - 1002 1003
100 enet 100100 1500 - - - - - 0 0
101 enet 100101 1500 - - - - - 0 0
102 enet 100102 1500 - - - - - 0 0
111 enet 100111 1500 - - - - - 0 0
1002 fddi 101002 1500 - - - - - 1 1003
1003 trcrf 101003 4472 1005 3276 - - srb 1 1002
1004 fdnet 101004 1500 - - 1 ibm - 0 0
1005 trbrf 101005 4472 - - 15 ibm - 0 0

VLAN AREHops STEHops Backup CRF

1003 7 7 off

Remote SPAN VLANs

Primary Secondary Type Ports

And here are the vlans on the switch of interest:

E2.128#show vlan

VLAN Name Status Ports

1 default active Gi0/50, Gi0/51, Gi0/52
100 VLAN0100 active Gi0/1, Gi0/2, Gi0/3, Gi0/4
Gi0/5, Gi0/6, Gi0/7, Gi0/8
Gi0/9, Gi0/10, Gi0/11, Gi0/12
Gi0/13, Gi0/14, Gi0/15, Gi0/16
Gi0/17, Gi0/18, Gi0/19, Gi0/20
Gi0/21, Gi0/22, Gi0/23, Gi0/24
Gi0/25, Gi0/26, Gi0/27, Gi0/28
Gi0/29, Gi0/30, Gi0/31, Gi0/32
Gi0/33, Gi0/34, Gi0/35, Gi0/36
Gi0/37, Gi0/39, Gi0/40, Gi0/41
Gi0/42, Gi0/43, Gi0/44, Gi0/45
Gi0/46, Gi0/47, Gi0/48
1002 fddi-default act/unsup
1003 trcrf-default act/unsup
1004 fddinet-default act/unsup
1005 trbrf-default act/unsup

VLAN Type SAID MTU Parent RingNo BridgeNo Stp BrdgMode Trans1 Trans2

1 enet 100001 1500 - - - - - 0 0
100 enet 100100 1500 - - - - - 0 0
1002 fddi 101002 1500 - - - - - 0 0
1003 trcrf 101003 4472 1005 3276 - - srb 0 0
1004 fdnet 101004 1500 - - - ieee - 0 0
1005 trbrf 101005 4472 - - 15 ibm - 0 0

VLAN AREHops STEHops Backup CRF

1003 7 7 off

Remote SPAN VLANs

Primary Secondary Type Ports

None of the server vlans seem to appear although the revision is current.
If I add or remove a vlan, as I did adding by RALPH to the server, it appears
on all other switches but not this one. The only vlan here is the one we manually added to get the switch to talk to us over the network.

Im resumitting the vlan data in brief form... sorry
Here is the server:

C1.1#show vlan br

VLAN Name Status Ports

1 default active Gi0/1, Gi0/26, Gi0/28
100 DATA active Gi0/3, Gi0/5, Gi0/6, Gi0/7
Gi0/8, Gi0/9, Gi0/10, Gi0/11
Gi0/12, Gi0/13, Gi0/14, Gi0/15
Gi0/16, Gi0/17, Gi0/18, Gi0/19
Gi0/20, Gi0/22, Gi0/23, Gi0/24
Gi0/25
101 GUEST active Gi0/2
102 VOICE active Gi0/5, Gi0/6, Gi0/7, Gi0/8
Gi0/9, Gi0/10, Gi0/11, Gi0/12
Gi0/13, Gi0/14, Gi0/15, Gi0/16
Gi0/17, Gi0/18, Gi0/19, Gi0/20
Gi0/21, Gi0/22, Gi0/23, Gi0/24
1002 fddi-default act/unsup
1003 trcrf-default act/unsup
1004 fddinet-default act/unsup
1005 trbrf-default act/unsup

Here is the problem client:

E2.128#show vlan br

VLAN Name Status Ports

1 default active Gi0/50, Gi0/51, Gi0/52
100 VLAN0100 active Gi0/1, Gi0/2, Gi0/3, Gi0/4
Gi0/5, Gi0/6, Gi0/7, Gi0/8
Gi0/9, Gi0/10, Gi0/11, Gi0/12
Gi0/13, Gi0/14, Gi0/15, Gi0/16
Gi0/17, Gi0/18, Gi0/19, Gi0/20
Gi0/21, Gi0/22, Gi0/23, Gi0/24
Gi0/25, Gi0/26, Gi0/27, Gi0/28
Gi0/29, Gi0/30, Gi0/31, Gi0/32
Gi0/33, Gi0/34, Gi0/35, Gi0/36
Gi0/37, Gi0/39, Gi0/40, Gi0/41
Gi0/42, Gi0/43, Gi0/44, Gi0/45
Gi0/46, Gi0/47, Gi0/48
1002 fddi-default act/unsup
1003 trcrf-default act/unsup
1004 fddinet-default act/unsup
1005 trbrf-default act/unsup

@Kevin-Davis,

Your domain name looks good on both
I think your password may not be matching on your switches.

Please issue: show vtp password to compare passwords on both of the switches. If different, change to the one you want. If they match, I would remove the passwords then set them again.
After that. on the vtp server, issue

vtp mode server
vtp primary force
vtp primary vlan force

Finally, Create a test vlan on vtp server...check to see if vlan propagates.

The passwords are hidden, but the encrypted versions matched.
If the passwords didn't match, I don't think the VTP revision would stay in sync and it does.
In any case, I removed the passwords and reset them to no avail.
I reset the the server mode and followed it with the force commands again to no avail.
I added a new vlan on the server. It appeared on the server, it appeared on other switches. It did NOT appear on the problem switch.

I removed the passwords again on both server and client then added another test vlan It acted exactly the same. It shows me the proper revision but no vlans change on the client.

We cleared the switches configuration back to factory new and reloaded our config file in an attempt to see what's wrong. It made no difference. The config file matches other switches that are working... at least I can't see any difference to speak of. I'm beginning to think this switch is defective although that doesn't make a lot of sense.

This is certainly bizarre, The "normal" issues like password mismatches, trunk problems, and domain mismatches do not appear to apply. Is the problem switch running the same IOS code release? I wonder what happens if we drop all switches back to VTP Version 2?

I went with version 3 because it allows me to hide the password. Version 2 doesnt support that. But, as a test I can certainly try. I thought there was a restriction on going back to version two from version 3. Perhaps not. I’ll give it a go.

The three switches I have been using for this testing are running exactly the same ios version as seen below:

The Server is running...

C1.1#show ver
Cisco IOS Software, C3560 Software (C3560-IPSERVICESK9-M), Version 12.2(55)SE12, RELEASE SOFTWARE (fc2)

The client that is working fine is running...

C1.89#show ver
Cisco IOS Software, C3560 Software (C3560-IPSERVICESK9-M), Version 12.2(55)SE12, RELEASE SOFTWARE (fc2)

The client with the issues is running...

E2.128#show ver
Cisco IOS Software, C3560 Software (C3560-IPSERVICESK9-M), Version 12.2(55)SE12, RELEASE SOFTWARE (fc2)

I tried dropping the switches back to version 2 and nothing seemed to work. I suspect this could be because there are a couple of switches between the server and the two clients I'm working with.... I can't be sure. I'll play with it a bit more tomorrow. I don't have a network map and don't want to recreate it tonight.

@Kevin-Davis,

Great idea to find out if there are non VTP switches in between the ones you listed!

They are all set to the same VTP version 3 settings. They are all properly responding with the sole exception of the problem switch. I just wasn’t sure if having them in the chain would prevent version 2 BPDUs from properly propagating along the version 3 chain.

I changed the problem switch as well as the one adjacent it to version 2. I set the adjacent switch to server mode and they seemed to operate properly. I could add/remove vlans on the server and the problem switch reacted properly to the changes. I changed them back to version 3 and now they won't talk to me. I suspect I lost a vlan or two on each. I'm going to get a console cable and fix the problem. Different building and it's 32 deg and nasty outside. Yuck!

Well, you're gonna love this one. I got a wild hair and decided to change the problem switch to server mode. When I did, it started working properly. I added a vlan to the primary server and it showed up on the problem switch. I then removed the vlan and it disappeared fro the problem switch. Now for the weird part... I changed it back to client mode and it still works properly. I added and removed a couple of vlans on the primary server to convince myself that it is working and the changes were always echoed on the problem switch.

I have no idea why this worked but it did. So I'd say my problem is solved.

@Kevin-Davis,

Great way to work through the problem! I just found the same solution online:

https://castroaa.blogspot.com/2016/10/troubleshooting-vtp-version-3.html

ROFL.. .timely. <g>
I can't find how to mark this as solved???

@Kevin-Davis,

It's ok it didn't post as question....I'll try and change that when I figure out how to get posted as question! Glad you're a member!

Just changed, it... so if you look in the lower right corner...you'll see Topic Tools. that 's a drop down list that will allow you to mark this as solved.