The infrastructure controller is the main architectural component of the Cisco ACI solution. It is the unified point of automation and management for the Cisco ACI fabric policy enforcement and health monitoring. The APIC appliance is a centralized clustered controller that optimizes performance and unifies operation of physical and virtual environments. The controller manages and operates a scalable multitenant Cisco ACI fabric.

The main features of the controller include:

• Application-centric network policies
• Data-model-based declarative provisioning
• Application and topology monitoring and troubleshooting
• Third-party integration (Layer 4 through Layer 7 [L4-L7) services and VMware vCenter and vShield)
• Image management (spine and leaf)
• Cisco ACI inventory and configuration
• Implementation on a distributed framework across a cluster of appliances
• Health scores for critical managed objects (tenants application profiles switches etc.)
• Fault event and performance management
• Cisco Application Virtual Switch (AVS) which can be used as a virtual leaf switch

The controller framework enables broad ecosystem and industry interoperability with Cisco ACI. It enables interoperability between a Cisco ACI environment and management orchestration virtualization and L4-L7 services from a broad range of vendors.

• Temperature: Operating: 32 to 104°F (0 to 40°C) (operating at sea level with no fan fail and no CPU throttling and with turbo mode)
• Temperature: Nonoperating: -40 to 158°F (-40 to 70°C)
• Humidity: Operating: 10 to 90% noncondensing
• Humidity: Nonoperating: 5 to 93% noncondensing
• Altitude: Operating: 0 to 10000 ft (0 to 3000m); maximum ambient temperature decreases by 1°C per 300m
• Altitude: Nonoperating: 0 to 40000 ft (12000m)