Automate your Cisco CCIE Home Lab for the INE Workbook v5

!-!-!-!-!-!-!-!-!
!-!-!-!-!-!-!-!-!

PLEASE SEE UPDATED 2018 VERSION HERE

Update your bookmarks to this link: https://linevty.com/automate-your-cisco-ccie-home-lab-for-the-ine-workbook-v5-updated-2018-2/

!-!-!-!-!-!-!-!-!
!-!-!-!-!-!-!-!-!

I recently gained access to an INE All Access Pass, which includes the Cisco CCIE Route and Switch v5 Workbook and various labs with a view to taking my lab exam.
Whilst it included some rack rental tokens I have the resources to build my own lab and use it whenever i see fit, no scheduling, no ongoing costs.  My only problem – how to automate the INE Workbook v5 initial config’s to my home lab as its a royal pain to have to copy and paste the config’s to potentially 24 devices each time i want to run a lab.
My goal was simple;

1. Be able to VPN to the lab from anywhere
2. Select a configuration
3. Have expect, telnet to each router and apply the configuration
4. Grab a coffee and come back with the routers ready to rock and roll for the INE workbook
5. When INE release new labs, be able to easily update it without any further code changes

!!!!!
DISCLAIMER: I am NOT a programmer, my code is certainly rubbish and inefficient – but it works for me.. YMMV
!!!!! 
So, enter some bash scripting and the awesome Expect. There are newer/better alternatives, but this does the job and my small no-programer brain could figure this out.
Massive shout out to http://paulgporter.net/2012/12/08/30/ for his article which is where i found out how to pass variables through to expect from a bash script.
My goal realised;

1. Be able to VPN in
   This ones easy – Cisco ASA in front and configure split tunnelling so i can stay connected and still get what i need.
2. Select a configuration
   My bash script (start-lab.sh) works by presenting a menu, the menu items come from indexing all the folders within the INE configurations folder (which are in /var/lab/configs/). The reason for this is if INE release a new set of configurations, i simply delete the ones i have and upload the new set, the menu system will pickup all the new config’s – no code changes required!.

   <Screenshot>

   
prompt="Please select a lab:"
options=( $(find /var/lab/configs/ -mindepth 2 -maxdepth 2 -type d) )
PS3="$prompt "
select opt in "${options[@]}" "Quit" ; do
if (( REPLY == 1 + ${#options[@]} )) ; then
exit
elif (( REPLY > 0 && REPLY <= ${#options[@]} )) ; then
echo "Your starting lab $REPLY which is lab $opt"
break
else
echo "Invalid option. Try another one."
fi
done

3. Once you select the menu item ($opt) (notice it actually shows a full path) it index’s the contents of said folder to work out which devices it needs to configure and dumps this to a text file for the next bit of code to use.  The reason for this is some labs contain 10 routers, others 20, some include the switches some don’t.
   
ls -1 $opt | sed -e 's/..*$//' > /var/lab/tmp/lab-devices.txt

4. I then pass the same variable ($opt) to the expect script (exp-start-lab.sh) for each device found in the text file generated in the last step ($device)
   
for device in `cat /var/lab/tmp/lab-devices.txt`; do
/var/lab/exp-start-lab.exp $opt $device &
done
   Quick Node: using the & it executes each router in parallel, you can do each router sequentially if you would prefer (obviously much slower but helps with troubleshooting) by changing it to;
   
/var/lab/exp-start-lab.exp $opt $device;

5. the expect script then starts and configures two variables ($opt becomes $lab and $device becomes $hostname) based on the information passed through from the bash script.
   
#!/usr/bin/expect -f
set timeout 2
exp_log_user 0
log_user 1
# Set variables
set lab [lindex $argv 0]
set hostname [lindex $argv 1]
6. Now, because each cisco router listens on a different port/IP address i have to generate a hostname and port for each $device which expect can actually use;
   
if { $hostname == "R1" } {
set address 192.168.1.101;
set port 3001;
} elseif { $hostname == "R2" } {
set address 192.168.1.101;
set port 3002;
} elseif { $hostname == "R3" } {
set address 192.168.1.101;
set port 3003;
} elseif { $hostname == "R4" } {
set address 192.168.1.101;
set port 3004;
----- SNIP ----- you get the idea
} elseif { $hostname == "R20" } {
set address 192.168.1.101;
set port 3020;
} elseif { $hostname == "SW1" } {
set address 192.168.1.102;
set port 4001;
----- SNIP ----- you get the idea
} elseif { $hostname == "SW4" } {
set address 192.168.1.102;
set port 4004;
} else {
error "no hostname"
}

7. Now we have the routers names and variables defined we can spawn telnet and start sending commands with expect. My process first makes sure its at at the enable prompt and then does a ‘configure replace’ to replace the routers running configuration with that of the ‘flash:base.config’ which i created earlier (contains priv level 15 for the console, no shut on gig1, no ip domain lookup etc). It then submits each configuration line from the devices configuration file on the device its connected to.
   
# Spawn telnet
spawn telnet $address $port
sleep 5
send "!n"
expect {
"(config*#" {
send "endr"
send_user ">>> Had to end to get Enable <<>> Got Enable <<