What it is
A Master Template is a reusable snapshot of a rack: its height and every device with its exact U position. Build your standard rack once — top-of-rack switch, PDU, patch panels, servers — save it as a master, and stamp it onto any other rack in two clicks.
The template is stored as a special rack named Master - {rack name} with location Template Library. It shows up in your rack list, so you can open it in the editor and keep refining the standard layout. Device notes are not copied into templates: a master holds the layout, not the per-unit annotations.
Typical use: an MSP that deploys the same branch-office rack at every client site, or a datacenter that standardizes rows of identical racks.
How to create a Master Template
- Go to the rack dashboard.
- Tick the checkbox of exactly one rack — the one whose layout you want to reuse.
- Click Create Master.
- Confirm. CreaRack clones the rack as Master - {rack name} in the Template Library, with the same height and all devices in place.
The original rack is untouched. You can edit the template afterwards like any rack — open it in the editor and add, move or remove devices.
How to copy a layout into a rack (Copy from…)
- Open the target rack in the Rack Editor.
- Click Copy from… in the toolbar.
- The modal opens with a single dropdown listing your Masters first and then every other rack of your system, each with its height (e.g.
Master - Branch Office (42U)). You don’t need to create a Master to copy a one-off rack — pick the rack directly. - Choose the Mode:
- Replace — deletes the devices currently in this rack and copies everything from the source. You are asked to confirm. (This is what the old Paste Master button did.)
- Add on top — keeps what you already have mounted and copies only the devices that fit in free units; anything that would collide is skipped.
- Click Copy. The page reloads with the copied devices laid out in the rack.
What travels and what doesn’t: the physical layout travels — stencils, positions, heights, port layouts. Device notes and management settings (IPs, credentials) are not copied, so you never end up with duplicated management IPs.
Device positions are copied exactly as they are in the source, so pick a target rack with the same height (or taller) than the source; devices that don’t fit are skipped.
Troubleshooting
- “Please select exactly one rack to create a Master Template.” — the Create Master button works on a single selection. Untick the extra racks.
- The dropdown says “Loading…” forever or errors — the rack list could not be fetched. Reload the editor and check you are still signed in.
- Devices vanished after copying — that is the documented behavior of Replace mode: the target rack is cleared first. Use Add on top to keep what’s there, or restore from a system backup if it was a mistake.
- Some devices didn’t appear after an “Add on top” copy — they collided with devices already mounted (or fell outside the rack height) and were skipped on purpose.
Related
- [[crearack—racks—crear-rack]] — create the racks you will stamp templates onto
- [[crearack—racks—dispositivos]] — fine-tune devices after applying a template
- [[crearack—racks—auto-provision]] — another way to populate racks fast
Véase también
- [[crearack—racks—crear-rack]]
- [[crearack—racks—dispositivos]]
- [[crearack—racks—auto-provision]]