So have you gotten sick of that buggy web interface for your Cisco router. Well I know I have and I tried my hardest to avoid it. But with CISCOs new CCPE 2.7(Cisco Configuration Professional Express) you can now say goodby to that shity afterthought of a web page configuration tool they use to pass off on there routers and switches. So lets have a look…
As you can see, it looks like they have finely hired some real graphic designers. If you are not familiar with the old interface, it looked like a web page cera 1995. The new layout and graphic bring it into the modern age. The new pages load fast and are pleasing to the eyes. However, the depth of configuration you can do from the web interface can only take you through the very basics of configuration. So let’s see what some of these tabs do.
AS you can see under the interfaces tab there is only the basic information for each interface. It shows if they are up or down and if they have IP address assigned to them. You can also see the description if you so choose. Of cores all this can be modified by selecting a line and hitting the EDIT button up top.
And aging under the DHCP/DNS/Host name tab it allows the basic configuration of these options. The User Management tab and static routing tab are more of the same.
The DashBoard tab is a useful addition as it combines three things I look at a lot and puts it into helpful easy to understand charts. It tells me my CPU Utilization, Flash memory, and Processor memory. All of which is available via the command line but not with the nice charts.
What the hell is this? The Plug and Play Server tab is not what you think it is. I can imagine when people see this tab they think UPnP, but Obi-Wan Ken-obi waves his hand in front of our collective faces and say, “this is not the Plug and Play you are looking for.” This acutely allows your ISP to configure your router for you when configured. That is Plug_and_play in a nutshell, if you want more info on it I am sure you can Google it! <OMG I used Google as a verb!>
If I find a single person using the Troubleshoot tab I will personally fly to wherever they are at and punch them in the face!!! Really!!! This tab allows you to do PINGs and Trace-routes, yes I know the command line versions are way better. Next in the WTF section I find the Configure CLI tab, If you are using this tab stop reading this right now and search for a program called putty, learn how to use it and you will never use a stupid tab like this aging.
Lastly, we have the Wi-Fi tab, it is very basic aging with the theme of express. This tabs functionality varies with the type of router you have. I personally have both a 891W and an 861W both with the CISCO Aironet 801 access point daughter boards on them. So on my routers if you hit the “Advanced wireless access point configuration” hyperlink, it will take you to the daughter boards webpage witch has many more options.
Overall, I think that the upgrade of CCPE from version 2.6 to 2.7 was a major improvement. Moreover, I recommend ant anyone who uses the web interface to upgrade as soon as possible. So stop yourself induced torture and upgrade now.
