Recommendations

[Mithrilhall]

I have some recommendations for Cirrus.

• When doing a refresh on the Node List, it would be a nice feature to have a Collapse All for the nodes. - All set
• Using the Import Wizard, when selecting Nodes allow the ability to sort by column titles - Supposed to be working but I still can'f find it
• Using the Import Wizard, have a check box that when checked hides all nodes that have already been imported.
• Alphabetize the Password drop-down lists.
• The ability to turn on/off the Auto-complete feature of the Password Lists.
• The ability to keep the newest x configs.

Other than that...I love this tool.

[BryanBecker]

I'd like to see during the inventory if its polling for arp table to also poll the current routing table.

BB

[DonYonce]

Leon,
Try this.... open Windows Scheduled Tasks. There you will see a list of the Config Management jobs. Right-Click on the job and select "Properties". You can now change the schedule from daily to hourly. Select "Schedule" tab and click on the "Advanced" button. For example: you can create a schedule that starts every morning at 6:00 AM and runs for 12 hours, repeating every 2 hours. This would start the download every two hours from 6:AM to 6:PM. You get the idea ...

"Only download changes" is in development right now. This was supposed to be in the initial release, but had some quirky issues and was postponed.

Notification of changes is in development also. Automatic download directly after a change notification is also in the works.

The "force the change back to the original" as an Action upon recognizing a change has happened is working in the lab. But, I'm not happy with it yet. We need to put a little more intelligence in the compare and transfer first. We need to release the indirect transfer methods (FTP, TFTP, SNMP, etc) before I'd feel comfortable with automatic changes to customer networks based on an Alert / Action.

Leon, you hit the nail on the head. That's the kind of stuff being worked on.

[ladato]

I'm adding my requests to the bunch:

1) Config backup more often than once per day (I know I can set up several jobs, but the possibility of overlap is there. I'd rather be able to back up every xx hours)

2) After download, automatically compare the config to the previous version.

3) IF a config has changed, the ability to launch an action (effectively, a config change becomes a "trigger" to an alarm). That action might be to email the difference, send a syslog message or (holy grail) force the old config back on the device.

Thanks again for building yet another amazing tool.

[Mithrilhall]

I was referring to saving to a file from a scheduled job.


Thanks

[DonYonce]

Saving the results of any scheduled job to a file will be added.
You can save the results of a "show command" by selecting File->Export.

I'm not sure what you mean by "saving the results of an upload config snippet". If you are talking about after uploading a config snippet interactively, you can save the results by selecting File->Export.
If you are talking about save to a file from a scheduled job, that is being added.

Thanks for the suggestion.

[Mithrilhall]

Don, any clue if my suggestion about saving the results of a show command or an upload config snippet to a text file (like you can do in Kiwi's Cattools 2)?

[DonYonce]

What a great idea !

quote:Originally posted by snowjay

So far I love this tool, so much easier than the clunky old CW2k. I do however have one recommendation/request/feature enhancement that I think would really be beneficial to some of us.

How about autodiscovery based on CDP? Sometimes switches will be put into service with out our (HQ) knowledge so it slips through the cracks and configs aren't backed up etc... During an inventory Cirrus is already capturing CDP details from each switch, but it would be nice to have anything new showing up on those CDP list be automatically added. Or maybe at the very least an Inventory Change report that can show if CDP info has changed.

Just an idea.

[Mithrilhall]

I see there are some formatting differences between the two:

Config Snippets --> Upload to Devices...

Right-Click node --> Show -->


I've created a new Config Snippet "sh bridge address-table" and I've created an Add/Edit Show Command "sh bridge address-table".

Using the Show menu the format is fine but when I use the upload Config Snippet to device the formatting is incorrect.

[snowjay]

So far I love this tool, so much easier than the clunky old CW2k. I do however have one recommendation/request/feature enhancement that I think would really be beneficial to some of us.

How about autodiscovery based on CDP? Sometimes switches will be put into service with out our (HQ) knowledge so it slips through the cracks and configs aren't backed up etc... During an inventory Cirrus is already capturing CDP details from each switch, but it would be nice to have anything new showing up on those CDP list be automatically added. Or maybe at the very least an Inventory Change report that can show if CDP info has changed.

Just an idea.

[DonYonce]

Also... select "File->Customize Menus and Toolbars". Once the customization dialog is displayed, you can now change the icon or text for any menu item or toolbar.

For example... click on the "Show" menu to display it. Now right-click on any item to change the image or text.

[DonYonce]

You can right-click on a Snippet and select "Upload to Devices".
This will bring up an Execute Command window with the devices you selected listed and the command script containing the Snippet. It's two clicks instead of one.

As for rearranging the Show menu. Select "File->Customize Menus and Toolbars". The customization dialog will pop up.
Leave the dialog up and ignore it for now. While the customization dialog is up, you can rearrange any menu or toolbar.

For example, click on the "Show" menu to display it. Then simply drag and drop each item from anywhere in the menu to anywhere else. You can also move menus, toolbars, etc.

One more thing.... the items from any tab in the customization dialog can be added to any menu.
Simply drag them out of the list and onto a menu or toolbar.

Have fun !

[Mithrilhall]

Another feature I would love to have is when scheduling a job and choosing "Execute Command Script on Devices" the ability to save the output to a text file and to a specific location.

I would also love to see a "Run Code Snippets" by right-clicking a node; such as the Show menu in the picture and have the ability to move items in the list up or down.

http://www.apartmenthost.com/images/cirrus.jpg

[Mithrilhall]

Thanks Don...and I just wanted to say that this is one amazing tool.

Keep up the good work!

[DonYonce]

Mithrilhall,

Those are excellent ideas for improvement.

1) Here are a couple of methods to collapse all on Node List refresh.
Select File->Settings. From the "Node List" panel (top one in the list) select the expansion level from the "Automatically expand the Node List to the XXXXX level" drop down. If you set this to Group, the Node List will be collapsed after a refresh.

Another method is to hold down the Control key and click on any '+' or '-' at the Group level in the Node List. This will Collapse/Expand everything at that level. But... I do not reccomend this approach for expanding all Nodes and showing Configs. Expand to all Configs does not work, you should expand them one at a time.

2)You are correct, the column sorting within the Import Wizard no longer functions. We'll look into it.

3)Hiding all duplicate Nodes is a good idea. Thanks !

4)Alphabetize the password drop downs works... kind-of. If the passwords in the databases are NOT excrypted, the passwords are sorted alphabetically. If they are encrypted, the encrypted version is sorted alphabetically, then they are decrypted and displayed. Oops, we goofed here. That little bug sqeaked through testing. Thanks for letting us know.

5)Turning off the auto-complete for passwords is not possible at this time.

6)There are a couple ways to "keep the newest xx configs". One method is to simply display only the last xx configs in the Node List. Select File->Settings. There is a slider on the "Node List" panel that allows from 1 to 100, or all configs to be displayed when the Node List is expanded. For example... if you set the slider to 10 configs. The last 10 configs will be displayed in the Node List when expanded. When you right-click on the Node and select "Edit Selected Node". All the Configs are available on the "Configuration History" tab. So... this change affects the number of Configs displayed, all Config are still kept in the database. (by the way... there is a release of Configuration Management where this does not function correctly, Setting the scroll bar to anything less that "All Configs" will cause the Node List to display "Loading Configs ..." or nothing)

A second method is to "Purge Old Configs". Select Configs->Purge Old Configs. From this dialog, you can delete all Configs from the database except the last XX. In a future release, "Purge Configs" will be available as an Scheduled Job. We purposely disabled the "Purge Old Configs" Scheduled Job in the current release.

One more item about "Keep the last xx Configs".....
A "Only Download Changes" option will be added to the Config Download process that will compare the download to the last config in the database. If there are no changes, the downloaded Config will not be added to the database. This would allow you to only store Configs that have changed in the database.