A lightweight, async-first network automation toolkit with plugin support and a rich CLI/shell interface.
Project description
Netimate
Netimate – a lightweight, async‑first network‑automation toolkit that feels as friendly as a REPL but scales like a platform.
⚠️ This project is in beta. Expect bugs, incomplete features, and breaking changes.
Table of Contents
- Why Netimate ?
- Features
- Quick Start
- Configuration
- Usage Examples
- Architecture
- Extending Netimate
- Development & Testing
- Contributing
- Roadmap
- License
Why Netimate ?
| Pain point 🥴 | Netimate’s answer 🚀 |
|---|---|
| Scripts that crawl device‑by‑device | Async SSH – run hundreds of commands in parallel |
| “Big‑bang” monolithic platforms | Modular plugins – bring only what you need (commands, protocols, repositories) |
| Separate tools for ad‑hoc tasks & CI pipelines | Unified CLI & Interactive Shell – same syntax everywhere |
| Manual diff reviews in Notepad | Snapshot & Diff – colour‑coded config diffs like Git |
| Wall‑of‑text outputs | Rich TUI – live tables & progress bars |
Features
- Async Scrapli SSH out of the box
- Plugin architecture – swap or extend protocols, device‑repositories, commands
- Interactive shell and single‑shot CLI (same binary)
- Snapshots → diff → approval workflows
- Filesystem template provider for TextFSM/TTP parsing
- Settings from YAML + runtime overrides via environment variables
- 100 % Python – import as a library, use in notebooks, or ship a single Docker image
Quick Start
# 1 ∙ Install
pip install "netimate[full]" # scrapli, netmiko, rich, pyyaml
# 2 ∙ Configure (minimal settings.yaml shown below)
export NETIMATE_CONFIG_PATH=$PWD/settings.yaml
# 3 ∙ Explore
netimate --shell # interactive REPL
# or
netimate run show-version on r1
Configuration
Environment Variables
| Variable | Default | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
NETIMATE_CONFIG_PATH |
~/.config/netimate/settings.yaml |
Explicit path to the YAML settings file. |
NETIMATE_EXTRA_PLUGIN_PACKAGES |
(unset) | Colon‑separated list of dotted package names to scan for third‑party plugins. |
settings.yaml
device_repo: yaml # plugin name
log_level: info # off | info | debug
template_paths: ["netimate.plugins.device_commands.templates"]
# Plugin settings example. Each plugin will get the settings listed below (provided the name matches)
plugin_configs:
yaml:
device_file: devices.yaml # path to inventory
scrapli_asyncssh:
transport_options:
asyncssh:
known_hosts_file: ~/user/.ssh/file.txt
device_repo– whichDeviceRepositoryplugin to load (yaml,postgres, etc.).plugin_configs– per‑plugin config blocks forwarded untouched.template_paths– extra directories searched by the template provider.
Usage Examples
Welcome to netimate Shell – type 'exit' to quit.
netimate> run show-version on dev
Running 'show-version' on dev.
Run 'show-version'........
╭──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── r1 ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮
│ ┏━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━┓ │
│ ┃ HOSTNAME ┃ SOFTWARE_IMAGE ┃ VERSION ┃ UPTIME ┃ RUNNING_IMAGE ┃ ROMMON ┃ RELEASE ┃ │
│ ┡━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━┩ │
│ │ R1 │ X86_64BI_LINUX-ADVENTERPRISEK9-M │ 17.12.1 │ 3 days, 46 minutes │ /x86_64_crb_linux-adventerprisek9-ms │ Bootstrap │ fc5 │ │
│ └──────────┴──────────────────────────────────┴─────────┴────────────────────┴──────────────────────────────────────┴───────────┴─────────┘ │
╰─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯
╭──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── r2 ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮
│ ┏━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━┓ │
│ ┃ HOSTNAME ┃ SOFTWARE_IMAGE ┃ VERSION ┃ UPTIME ┃ RUNNING_IMAGE ┃ ROMMON ┃ RELEASE ┃ │
│ ┡━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━┩ │
│ │ R2 │ X86_64BI_LINUX-ADVENTERPRISEK9-M │ 17.12.1 │ 3 days, 46 minutes │ /x86_64_crb_linux-adventerprisek9-ms │ Bootstrap │ fc5 │ │
│ └──────────┴──────────────────────────────────┴─────────┴────────────────────┴──────────────────────────────────────┴───────────┴─────────┘ │
╰─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯
netimate> diagnostic dev
Diagnostics on dev.
Diagnostics on dev.......................................
╭────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── r1 diagnostics ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮
│ ┏━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┓ │
│ ┃ Command ┃ Summary ┃ │
│ ┡━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┩ │
│ │ Platform Info │ X86_64BI_LINUX-ADVENTERPRISEK9-M - 17.12.1 │ │
│ │ Interfaces (IP Brief) │ 3 up, 1 down │ │
│ │ Memory Stats │ 129.6MB / 831.8MB (15.6%) — OK │ │
│ │ CPU Stats │ │ │
│ │ System Logging │ 20x Notice, 3x Info │ │
│ └───────────────────────┴────────────────────────────────────────────┘ │
╰─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯
╭────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── r2 diagnostics ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮
│ ┏━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┓ │
│ ┃ Command ┃ Summary ┃ │
│ ┡━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┩ │
│ │ Platform Info │ X86_64BI_LINUX-ADVENTERPRISEK9-M - 17.12.1 │ │
│ │ Interfaces (IP Brief) │ 3 up, 1 down │ │
│ │ Memory Stats │ 129.6MB / 831.8MB (15.6%) — OK │ │
│ │ CPU Stats │ │ │
│ │ System Logging │ 20x Notice, 3x Info │ │
│ └───────────────────────┴────────────────────────────────────────────┘ │
╰─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯
netimate> run show-ip-interface-brief on dev
Running 'show-ip-interface-brief' on dev.
Run 'show-ip-interface-brief'........
╭──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── r1 ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮
│ ┏━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━┓ │
│ ┃ INTERFACE ┃ IP_ADDRESS ┃ STATUS ┃ PROTO ┃ │
│ ┡━━━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━┩ │
│ │ Ethernet0/0 │ 10.10.10.100 │ up │ up │ │
│ ├─────────────┼──────────────┼───────────────────────┼───────┤ │
│ │ Ethernet0/1 │ 1.1.1.1 │ up │ up │ │
│ ├─────────────┼──────────────┼───────────────────────┼───────┤ │
│ │ Ethernet0/2 │ 10.10.20.171 │ up │ up │ │
│ ├─────────────┼──────────────┼───────────────────────┼───────┤ │
│ │ Ethernet0/3 │ unassigned │ administratively down │ down │ │
│ └─────────────┴──────────────┴───────────────────────┴───────┘ │
╰─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯
╭──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── r2 ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮
│ ┏━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━┓ │
│ ┃ INTERFACE ┃ IP_ADDRESS ┃ STATUS ┃ PROTO ┃ │
│ ┡━━━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━╇━━━━━━━┩ │
│ │ Ethernet0/0 │ 20.20.20.100 │ up │ up │ │
│ ├─────────────┼──────────────┼───────────────────────┼───────┤ │
│ │ Ethernet0/1 │ 1.1.1.2 │ up │ up │ │
│ ├─────────────┼──────────────┼───────────────────────┼───────┤ │
│ │ Ethernet0/2 │ 10.10.20.172 │ up │ up │ │
│ ├─────────────┼──────────────┼───────────────────────┼───────┤ │
│ │ Ethernet0/3 │ unassigned │ administratively down │ down │ │
│ └─────────────┴──────────────┴───────────────────────┴───────┘ │
╰─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯
netimate>
Architecture
Click to view Mermaid diagram
graph TD
%% ─────────────── VIEW ───────────────
subgraph View_Layer
CLI["CLI<br/>view/cli/cli.py"]
Shell["Interactive Shell<br/>view/shell/shell.py"]
end
%% ────────── COMPOSITION ────────────
subgraph Composition
CompRoot["composition_root<br/>netimate/composition.py"]
end
%% ───────── APPLICATION ─────────────
subgraph Application_Layer
App["Application<br/>application/application.py"]
end
%% ─────── CORE / PLUGIN ENGINE ──────
subgraph Core_Plugin_Engine
Runner["Runner<br/>core/runner.py"]
PluginRegistry["Plugin Registry<br/>core/plugin_engine/plugin_registry.py"]
PluginLoader["Plugin Loader<br/>core/plugin_engine/loader.py"]
PluginRegistrar["Plugin Registrar<br/>core/plugin_engine/registrar.py"]
end
%% ─────────── INTERFACES ────────────
subgraph Interfaces
IF_Repo["DeviceRepository_IF"]
IF_Proto["ConnectionProtocol_IF"]
IF_Cmd["DeviceCommand_IF"]
IF_Settings["Settings_IF"]
end
%% ─────────── INFRASTRUCTURE ────────
subgraph Infrastructure
ConfigLoader["ConfigLoader<br/>infrastructure/config_loader.py"]
Settings["Settings<br/>infrastructure/settings.py"]
Logger["Logging<br/>infrastructure/logging.py"]
TemplateProvider["FileSystemTemplateProvider<br/>infrastructure/template_provider/filesystem.py"]
end
%% ─ CONNECTION PROTOCOL PLUG‑INS ────
subgraph Connection_Protocol_Plugins
NetmikoSSH["NetmikoSSHConnection"]
NetmikoTelnet["NetmikoTelnetConnection"]
ScrapliAsyncSSH["ScrapliAsyncSSHConnection"]
end
%% ─ DEVICE REPOSITORY PLUG‑INS ──────
subgraph Device_Repository_Plugins
YAMLRepo["YAMLRepository"]
PostgresRepo["PostgresRepository"]
end
%% ───── DEVICE COMMAND PLUG‑INS ─────
subgraph Device_Command_Plugins
EchoTest["echo_test"]
ShowEnv["show_environment"]
ShowVer["show_version"]
ShowInt["show_ip_interface_brief"]
ShowMem["show_memory_stats"]
ShowCPU["show_process_cpu"]
ShowLog["show_logging"]
ShowRunCfg["show_running_config"]
end
%% ───────────── MODELS ───────────────
subgraph Models
DeviceModel["Device<br/>models/device.py"]
end
%% ──────────── DATA FLOW ─────────────
CLI --> CompRoot
Shell --> CompRoot
CompRoot --> App
CompRoot --> Logger
App --> Runner
App --> IF_Repo
App --> IF_Proto
App --> IF_Cmd
App --> IF_Settings
App --> TemplateProvider
Runner --> PluginRegistry
PluginRegistry --> PluginLoader
PluginRegistry --> PluginRegistrar
IF_Repo --> YAMLRepo
IF_Repo --> PostgresRepo
IF_Proto --> NetmikoSSH
IF_Proto --> NetmikoTelnet
IF_Proto --> ScrapliAsyncSSH
IF_Cmd --> EchoTest
IF_Cmd --> ShowEnv
IF_Cmd --> ShowVer
IF_Cmd --> ShowInt
IF_Cmd --> ShowMem
IF_Cmd --> ShowCPU
IF_Cmd --> ShowLog
IF_Cmd --> ShowRunCfg
IF_Settings --> Settings
Settings --> ConfigLoader
Extending Netimate
Write a new Device Command plugin
# my_plugins/show_cdp_neighbors.py
from netimate.interfaces.plugin.device_command import DeviceCommand
class ShowCdpNeighbors(DeviceCommand):
table_headers = ["NEIGHBOR", "LOCAL_IF", "REMOTE_IF"]
def template_file(self) -> str:
return "ios/cisco_ios_show_cdp_neighbours.textfsm"
@staticmethod
def plugin_name() -> str:
return "show-cdp-neighbors"
def command_string(self):
return "show cdp neighbors detail"
def parse(self, raw: str):
# convert raw TextFSM record list into rows matching table_headers
...
export PYTHONPATH=$PWD/my_plugins
export NETIMATE_EXTRA_PLUGIN_PACKAGES=my_plugins
netimate run show-cdp-neighbors on r1
Other plugin types
- ConnectionProtocol – SSH, Telnet, RESTCONF, etc.
- DeviceRepository – YAML, CMDB, IPAM, Postgres…
See/plugins/*for working examples.
Development & Testing
git clone https://github.com/sjdigiovanni/netimate.git
cd netimate
make setup # install dev requirements
make ci # black, isort, mypy, pytest
Contributing
Pull requests are welcome! Discussions and RFCs live in the Discussions tab.
Roadmap
- Robust error handling
- Bring CLI and Shell to parity
- Multi‑protocol auto‑discovery & topology graph export
- NETCONF / RESTCONF support
- Web UI (FastAPI + WebSockets)
Track progress on the projects board.
License
Netimate is licensed under the Mozilla Public License 2.0 – see LICENSE for details.
Release history Release notifications | RSS feed
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