I have been doing networking for almost 20 years and have taken several programming classes in the pursuit of my college degree. I always said “I hate programming and I will never be a programmer.” Well I am still not a programmer, but I am starting to use some of that programming education. I have been interested in automation and SDN which led to the need to write in a programming language. I have chosen Python and it is a very powerful tool to automate remedial tasks in network configuration. It also helps take the errors out of mass configurations. One simple script I wrote SSH into all my switches and saves the running configuration to a file on my file server. I can schedule the script to run every week or month and my configs are always backed up for free. If I am doing a new install of one or many new switches, I can script the install of basic config options to the switches fast and easy with no errors. Simply put, you need help in networking and a programming language can help. Python is not the only option, just one of the most popular. I have done the same scripts in PowerShell. Go to the website and check out the scripting page for examples and training I used to learn.
David Ellis
Solutions Architect
Business Communications, Inc. (BCI)
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