Did you know you can use netlab to generate reports describing your lab topology, IP addressing, BGP details, or OSPF areas? The magic command (netlab report) was introduced in August 2023, followed by netlab show reports to display the available reports a few months later.

You can generate the reports in text, Markdown, or HTML format. The desired format is selected with the report name suffix. For example, the bgp-asn.md report will create Markdown text.

Let’s see how that works.

You’ll need a working netlab installation if you want to follow along. If you don’t have that:

• Open the BGP labs in GitHub codespaces
• Switch to the basic/1-session directory
• Execute netlab up

OK, now everyone’s on the same page, right? Let’s go:

• netlab report creates reports from the transformed lab topology data, usually stored in netlab.snapshot.yml
• The snapshot file is created when a lab is started; thus, you can always create a report based on a running lab.
• If you don’t want to start a lab, execute netlab create to create the files you get during the netlab up process, including the netlab.snapshot.yml file.

Next step: what report do you want to create?

• Use netlab show reports to display all available reports.
• That list might be a bit overwhelming, so you can limit the reports to a single markup type by adding the desired suffix as a command argument. For example, if you’re interested in HTML reports, use netlab show reports .html
• If you’re interested in a specific technology, use that technology as a command line argument. For example, use netlab show reports bgp to display all BGP-related reports.

Finally, create a report:

• Use netlab report _report_name_ to create a report. Add an output file name if you want to store a report in a file.
• You might want to create a report on a subset of lab devices. For example, when writing the BGP labs instructions, I often needed a report listing the BGP neighbors of a single router. Use the --node X argument to select one or more nodes; in the simple BGP lab, I would use (for example) netlab report bgp-neighbor.md --node x1
• You can use wildcards or list several nodes (separated by commas) in the list of nodes.

Last but not least, squeeze the most out of the operating system CLI. For example, I would use netlab report bgp-asn.md|pbcopy to get the markdown table describing the BGP autonomous systems into the MacOS pasteboard (and copy it directly into the lab instructions document).

Getting Started

New to netlab? Start with the Getting Started document and the installation guide.

You can also run netlab within your browser using (free) GitHub codespaces. To do that, you need a GitHub repository referencing the netlab devcontainer, for example, the BGP labs or netlab examples.