Cisco 500 Series Administration Manual page 484

Security: 802.1X Authentication
Overview of 802. 1 X
Cisco 500 Series Stackable Managed Switch Administration Guide
This is described in the figure below:
A network device can be either a client/supplicant, authenticator or both per port.
Client or Supplicant
A client or supplicant is a network device that requests access to the LAN. The
client is connected to an authenticator.
If the client uses the 802.1x protocol for authentication, it runs the supplicant part
of the 802.1x protocol and the client part of the EAP protocol.
No special software is required on the client to use MAC-based or web-based
authentication.
Authenticator
An authenticator is a network device that provides network services and to which
supplicant ports are connected.
The following authentication modes on ports are supported (these modes are set
in Security > 802.1X/MAC/Web Authentication > Host and Authentication):
• Single-host—Supports port-based authentication with a single client per
port.
• Multi-host—Supports port-based authentication with a multiple clients per
port.
• Multi-sessions—Supports client-based authentication with a multiple
clients per port.
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