Terminal IOSXE Chatbot (IXC)

Terminal-based chatbot assistant for Cisco IOS-XE devices powered by OpenAI GPT-4o

Description

Terminal IOSXE Chatbot is a terminal-driven assistant designed for network engineers to interact with Cisco IOS-XE routers and switches. It leverages the OpenAI API to provide intelligent responses and suggested commands, facilitating easier diagnostics, troubleshooting, and device configuration through a conversational interface.

The chatbot uses Netmiko for device interaction and integrates with OpenAI's API to process user queries and generate JSON-formatted command, answer, or configuration responses. It adheres to a strict prompt specification to ensure predictable, machine-parsable outputs.

Features

• Live CLI interaction with Cisco IOS-XE devices via SSH
• OpenAI powered assistant trained to respond with JSON-formatted output
• Automatically executes commands and configuration changes based on LLM responses
• Paged terminal output and context window management
• Custom developer prompt specification
• Token usage tracking
• Support for multiple models

Demo

$ python trixc.py 192.0.2.1
┌──(1)-(IOS-XE Chatbot)-(gpt-4.1)
└─ r1#

Installation

1. Clone the Repository

git clone https://github.com/splitnines/iosxe_chatbot.git
cd iosxe_chatbot

2. Install Dependencies (via uv or pip)

If you're using uv:

uv venv
source .venv/bin/activate
uv pip install -r requirements.txt

Or with pip:

python -m venv venv
source venv/bin/activate
pip install -r requirements.txt

3. Export Environment Variables

export IXC_USERNAME=your_username
export IXC_PASSWORD=your_password
export OPENAI_API_KEY=your_openai_api_key

4. Run the Chatbot

python ixc.py <DEVICE_IP_OR_HOSTNAME>

Prompt Design

The system prompt (iosxe_prompt.md) instructs the assistant to:

• Respond with structured JSON
• Suggest CLI commands to execute on the Cisco device
• Output detailed answers when appropriate
• Ask for clarification if necessary
• Never combine command, configure, or answer keys in one response

Example:

{"command": ["show ip interface brief"]}

{"answer": "Interface is administratively down."}

{"configure": ["interface Loopback0", "ip address 10.0.0.1 255.255.255.0"]}

Commands

During interaction, you may use the following slash commands:

Command	Description
/c	Execute a command directly
/m	Display command menu
/n	Start a new context window
/p	View the developer prompt
/q	Quit and disconnect
/r	Reload the developer prompt
/s	Select model

Acknowledgements

• Open Source Community for Python and the rich ecosystem of libraries
• John CapobiancoAutomateYourNetwork for sharing his work and inspiring this project.

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License. See the LICENSE file for details.