Re: Cisco config generator

[Phil Howard <phil () charon milepost com>]

> Hi Dave,
>
> Take a look at Network Configurator from Netsation (www.netsation.com).
> I is pretty interesting.
>
>
>
> Paul Quinn, CCIE
> MCI Systemhouse

Is this what MCI uses to construct and manage their entire IP network?

I'm looking for a tool to do configuration management, too.  But I need
one with the following:

1.  Knows how to configure Cisco/IOS
2.  Knows how to configure Ascend/MAX and Ascend/GRF/gated
3.  Configures lots of other things, too:
    a.  Radius for all Ascend and Livinston servers (MAX, PM)
    b.  All users in all POP servers for all domains we serve
    c.  Mail forwarders
    d.  Web sites, whether domain, subdirectory, or userid based
    e.  Shell accounts

If, for example, one user is set up with a variety of access services,
and I disable or delete that user, then it should be removed from all
places where it is configured without me having to know.

Yes, I do combine my network operations and server operations together
and I want a package that allows me to fully integrate it all together
without having to have separate packages.

Writing this myself will be a big project.  Well, big for one person.
It wouldn't be that big for a software development business that is
banking on selling it to a lot of providers.  But is there even a
market for this?

One thing I note about Netsation's product is that they promote it as
a tool to deal with "cryptic IOS commands".  IOS is _NOT_ cryptic.
Anyone who thinks it is after proper training shouldn't be in the
technical end of this business.  OTOH, that comes from a quote from
PC Week magazine, and I'm not surprised they find it cryptic.

Where such a product is useful is managing the huge complexity of a
large network, and in the case of what I am looking for, all of the
other services as well.

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