This template goes hand in hand with the second installment in our Cisco tutorial series, “Configuring the Cisco 851W or 871W: Standard IOS.” The template makes it easy to document and create CLI configuration files. You just plug in the appropriate values for a list of variables and click a button to produce the configuration output. You can then copy and paste the output to your console.

In addition to helping with initial setup, the worksheet serves as permanent documentation. Anyone with any knowledge of Cisco devices should be able to look at the output and understand what’s going on, and the spreadsheet format makes the Cisco CLI more readable and understandable.