Command Line Interface
The VyOS CLI comprises an operational and a configuration mode.
Operational Mode
Operational mode allows for commands to perform operational system tasks and view system and service status, while configuration mode allows for the modification of system configuration.
The CLI provides a built-in help system. In the CLI the ? key may be used
to display available commands. The TAB key can be used to auto-complete
commands and will present the help system upon a conflict or unknown value.
For example typing sh followed by the TAB key will complete to
show. Pressing TAB a second time will display the possible
sub-commands of the show command.
vyos@vyos:~$ s[tab]
set show
Example showing possible show commands:
vyos@vyos:~$ show [tab]
Possible completions:
arp Show Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) information
bridge Show bridging information
cluster Show clustering information
configuration Show running configuration
conntrack Show conntrack entries in the conntrack table
conntrack-sync
Show connection syncing information
date Show system date and time
dhcp Show Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) information
dhcpv6 Show status related to DHCPv6
disk Show status of disk device
dns Show Domain Name Server (DNS) information
file Show files for a particular image
firewall Show firewall information
flow-accounting
Show flow accounting statistics
hardware Show system hardware details
history show command history
host Show host information
incoming Show ethernet input-policy information
: q
You can scroll up with the keys [Shift]+[PageUp] and scroll down with
[Shift]+[PageDown].
When the output of a command results in more lines than can be displayed on the
terminal screen the output is paginated as indicated by a : prompt.
- When viewing in page mode the following commands are available:
qkey can be used to cancel outputspacewill scroll down one pagebwill scroll back one pagereturnwill scroll down one lineup-arrowanddown-arrowwill scroll up or down one line at a time respectivelyleft-arrowandright-arrowcan be used to scroll left or right in the event that the output has lines which exceed the terminal size.
Configuration Mode
To enter configuration mode use the configure command:
vyos@vyos:~$ configure
[edit]
vyos@vyos:~#
Note
Prompt changes from $ to #. To exit configuration mode,
type exit.
vyos@vyos:~# exit
exit
vyos@vyos:~$
See the configuration section of this document for more information on configuration mode.
Configuration Overview
VyOS makes use of a unified configuration file for the entire system’s
configuration: /config/config.boot. This allows easy template
creation, backup, and replication of system configuration. A system can
thus also be easily cloned by simply copying the required configuration
files.
Terminology
A VyOS system has three major types of configurations:
Active or running configuration is the system configuration that is loaded and currently active (used by VyOS). Any change in the configuration will have to be committed to belong to the active/running configuration.
Working configuration is the one that is currently being modified in configuration mode. Changes made to the working configuration do not go into effect until the changes are committed with the
commitcommand. At which time the working configuration will become the active or running configuration.Saved configuration is the one saved to a file using the
savecommand. It allows you to keep safe a configuration for future uses. There can be multiple configuration files. The default or “boot” configuration is saved and loaded from the file/config/config.boot.
Editing the configuration
The configuration can be edited by the use of set and
delete commands from within configuration mode.
Configuration commands are flattened from the tree into ‘one-liner’
commands shown in show configuration commands from operation
mode. Commands are relative to the level where they are executed and all
redundant information from the current level is removed from the command
entered.
[edit]
vyos@vyos# set interface ethernet eth0 address 192.0.2.100/24
[edit interfaces ethernet eth0]
vyos@vyos# set address 203.0.113.6/24
These two commands above are essentially the same, just executed from different levels in the hierarchy.
To delete a configuration entry use the delete command,
this also deletes all sub-levels under the current level you’ve
specified in the delete command. Deleting an entry will
also result in the element reverting back to its default value if one
exists.
[edit interfaces ethernet eth0]
vyos@vyos# delete address 192.0.2.100/24
Any change you do on the configuration, will not take effect until
committed using the commit command in configuration mode.
vyos@vyos# commit
[edit]
vyos@vyos# exit
Warning: configuration changes have not been saved.
vyos@vyos:~$
Use this command to preserve configuration changes upon reboot. By default it is stored at /config/config.boot. In the case you want to store the configuration file somewhere else, you can add a local path, a SCP address, a FTP address or a TFTP address.
vyos@vyos# save
Saving configuration to '/config/config.boot'...
Done
vyos@vyos# save [tab]
Possible completions:
<Enter> Save to system config file
<file> Save to file on local machine
scp://<user>:<passwd>@<host>:/<file> Save to file on remote machine
ftp://<user>:<passwd>@<host>/<file> Save to file on remote machine
tftp://<host>/<file> Save to file on remote machine
vyos@vyos# save tftp://192.168.0.100/vyos-test.config.boot
Saving configuration to 'tftp://192.168.0.100/vyos-test.config.boot'...
######################################################################## 100.0%
Done
Configuration mode can not be exited while uncommitted changes exist.
To exit configuration mode without applying changes, the
exit discard command must be used.
All changes in the working config will thus be lost.
vyos@vyos# exit
Cannot exit: configuration modified.
Use 'exit discard' to discard the changes and exit.
[edit]
vyos@vyos# exit discard
Use this command to temporarily commit your changes and set the
number of minutes available for validation. confirm must
be entered within those minutes, otherwise the system will reboot
into the previous configuration. The default value is 10 minutes.
What if you are doing something dangerous? Suppose you want to setup
a firewall, and you are not sure there are no mistakes that will lock
you out of your system. You can use confirmed commit. If you issue
the commit-confirm command, your changes will be committed, and if
you don’t issue the confirm command in 10 minutes, your
system will reboot into previous config revision.
vyos@router# set firewall interface eth0 local name FromWorld
vyos@router# commit-confirm
commit confirm will be automatically reboot in 10 minutes unless confirmed
Proceed? [confirm]y
[edit]
vyos@router# confirm
[edit]
Note
A reboot because you did not enter confirm will not
take you necessarily to the saved configuration, but to the
point before the unfortunate commit.
Copy a configuration element.
You can copy and remove configuration subtrees. Suppose you set up a
firewall ruleset FromWorld with one rule that allows traffic from
specific subnet. Now you want to setup a similar rule, but for
different subnet. Change your edit level to
firewall name FromWorld and use copy rule 10 to rule 20, then
modify rule 20.
vyos@router# show firewall name FromWorld
default-action drop
rule 10 {
action accept
source {
address 203.0.113.0/24
}
}
[edit]
vyos@router# edit firewall name FromWorld
[edit firewall name FromWorld]
vyos@router# copy rule 10 to rule 20
[edit firewall name FromWorld]
vyos@router# set rule 20 source address 198.51.100.0/24
[edit firewall name FromWorld]
vyos@router# commit
[edit firewall name FromWorld]
Rename a configuration element.
You can also rename config subtrees:
vyos@router# rename rule 10 to rule 5
[edit firewall name FromWorld]
vyos@router# commit
[edit firewall name FromWorld]
Note that show command respects your edit level and from this
level you can view the modified firewall ruleset with just show
with no parameters.
vyos@router# show
default-action drop
rule 5 {
action accept
source {
address 203.0.113.0/24
}
}
rule 20 {
action accept
source {
address 198.51.100.0/24
}
}
Add comment as an annotation to a configuration node.
The comment command allows you to insert a comment above the
<config node> configuration section. When shown, comments are
enclosed with /* and */ as open/close delimiters. Comments
need to be committed, just like other config changes.
To remove an existing comment from your current configuration,
specify an empty string enclosed in double quote marks ("") as
the comment text.
Example:
vyos@vyos# comment firewall all-ping "Yes I know this VyOS is cool"
vyos@vyos# commit
vyos@vyos# show
firewall {
/* Yes I know this VyOS is cool */
all-ping enable
broadcast-ping disable
...
}
Note
An important thing to note is that since the comment is
added on top of the section, it will not appear if the show
<section> command is used. With the above example, the show
firewall command would return starting after the firewall
{ line, hiding the comment.
Access opmode from config mode
When inside configuration mode you are not directly able to execute operational commands.
Access to these commands are possible through the use of the
run [command] command. From this command you will have access to
everything accessible from operational mode.
Command completion and syntax help with ? and [tab] will also
work.
[edit]
vyos@vyos# run show interfaces
Codes: S - State, L - Link, u - Up, D - Down, A - Admin Down
Interface IP Address S/L Description
--------- ---------- --- -----------
eth0 0.0.0.0/0 u/u
Managing configurations
VyOS comes with an integrated versioning system for the system configuration. It automatically maintains a backup of every previous configuration which has been committed to the system. The configurations are versioned locally for rollback but they can also be stored on a remote host for archiving/backup reasons.
Local Archive
Revisions are stored on disk. You can view, compare and rollback them to any previous revisions if something goes wrong.
View all existing revisions on the local system.
vyos@vyos:~$ show system commit
0 2015-03-30 08:53:03 by vyos via cli
1 2015-03-30 08:52:20 by vyos via cli
2 2015-03-26 21:26:01 by root via boot-config-loader
3 2015-03-26 20:43:18 by root via boot-config-loader
4 2015-03-25 11:06:14 by root via boot-config-loader
5 2015-03-25 01:04:28 by root via boot-config-loader
6 2015-03-25 00:16:47 by vyos via cli
7 2015-03-24 23:43:45 by root via boot-config-loader
You can specify the number of revisions stored on disk. N can be in the range of 0 - 65535. When the number of revisions exceeds the configured value, the oldest revision is removed. The default setting for this value is to store 100 revisions locally.
Compare configurations
VyOS lets you compare different configurations.
Use this command to spot what the differences are between different configurations.
vyos@vyos# compare [tab]
Possible completions:
<Enter> Compare working & active configurations
saved Compare working & saved configurations
<N> Compare working with revision N
<N> <M> Compare revision N with M
Revisions:
0 2013-12-17 20:01:37 root by boot-config-loader
1 2013-12-13 15:59:31 root by boot-config-loader
2 2013-12-12 21:56:22 vyos by cli
3 2013-12-12 21:55:11 vyos by cli
4 2013-12-12 21:27:54 vyos by cli
5 2013-12-12 21:23:29 vyos by cli
6 2013-12-12 21:13:59 root by boot-config-loader
7 2013-12-12 16:25:19 vyos by cli
8 2013-12-12 15:44:36 vyos by cli
9 2013-12-12 15:42:07 root by boot-config-loader
10 2013-12-12 15:42:06 root by init
The command compare allows you to compare different type of
configurations. It also lets you compare different revisions through
the compare N M command, where N and M are revision
numbers. The output will describe how the configuration N is when
compared to M indicating with a plus sign (+) the additional
parts N has when compared to M, and indicating with a minus sign
(-) the lacking parts N misses when compared to M.
vyos@vyos# compare 0 6
[edit interfaces]
+dummy dum1 {
+ address 10.189.0.1/31
+}
[edit interfaces ethernet eth0]
+vif 99 {
+ address 10.199.0.1/31
+}
-vif 900 {
- address 192.0.2.4/24
-}
The command above also lets you see the difference between two commits. By default the difference with the running config is shown.
vyos@router# run show system commit diff 4
[edit system]
+ipv6 {
+ disable-forwarding
+}
This means four commits ago we did set system ipv6 disable-forwarding.
Rollback Changes
You can rollback configuration changes using the rollback command. This will apply the selected revision and trigger a system reboot.
Remote Archive
VyOS can upload the configuration to a remote location after each call
to commit. You will have to set the commit-archive location.
TFTP, FTP, SCP and SFTP servers are supported. Every time a
commit is successful the config.boot file will be copied
to the defined destination(s). The filename used on the remote host will
be config.boot-hostname.YYYYMMDD_HHMMSS.
Specify remote location of commit archive as any of the below URI
http://<user>:<passwd>@<host>:/<dir>https://<user>:<passwd>@<host>:/<dir>ftp://<user>:<passwd>@<host>/<dir>sftp://<user>:<passwd>@<host>/<dir>scp://<user>:<passwd>@<host>:/<dir>tftp://<host>/<dir>git+https://<user>:<passwd>@<host>/<path>
Note
The number of revisions don’t affect the commit-archive.
Note
You may find VyOS not allowing the secure connection because
it cannot verify the legitimacy of the remote server. You can use
the workaround below to quickly add the remote host’s SSH
fingerprint to your ~/.ssh/known_hosts file:
vyos@vyos# ssh-keyscan <host> >> ~/.ssh/known_hosts
Saving and loading manually
You can use the save and load commands if you want to manually
manage specific configuration files.
When using the save command, you can add a specific location where
to store your configuration file. And, when needed it, you will be able
to load it with the load command:
Use this command to load a configuration which will replace the running configuration. Define the location of the configuration file to be loaded. You can use a path to a local file, an SCP address, an SFTP address, an FTP address, an HTTP address, an HTTPS address or a TFTP address.
vyos@vyos# load
Possible completions:
<Enter> Load from system config file
<file> Load from file on local machine
scp://<user>:<passwd>@<host>:/<file> Load from file on remote machine
sftp://<user>:<passwd>@<host>/<file> Load from file on remote machine
ftp://<user>:<passwd>@<host>/<file> Load from file on remote machine
http://<host>/<file> Load from file on remote machine
https://<host>/<file> Load from file on remote machine
tftp://<host>/<file> Load from file on remote machine
Restore Default
In the case you want to completely delete your configuration and restore the default one, you can enter the following command in configuration mode:
load /opt/vyatta/etc/config.boot.default
You will be asked if you want to continue. If you accept, you will have
to use commit if you want to make the changes active.
Then you may want to save in order to delete the saved
configuration too.
Note
If you are remotely connected, you will lose your connection. You may want to copy first the config, edit it to ensure connectivity, and load the edited config.