The CLI supports numerous show commands. To view the various show commands that the CLI supports, type show ?.

sonic# show ?
  aaa                      Show aaa info
  bfd                      Bidirection Forwarding Detection
  bgp                      show bgp community, ext community, as list information
  image                    Show image information
  interface                Show Interface info
  ip                       show IP commands
  ipv6                     show IP commands
  kdump                    Show kdump status
  link                     Show link state tracking information
  lldp                     Show lldp information
  mac                      Show MAC
  mclag                    Show mclag domain
  mirror-session           Show Mirror session information
  nat                      Show NAT info
  NeighbourSuppressStatus  Show arp and nd suppression status
  platform                 Show platform information
  PortChannel              LAG status and configuration
  ***** OUTPUT TRUNCATED ******

A user can take advantage of the CLI to access the information and data that is associated with the SONiC NOS and hardware. The following examples depict how the show command gathers system details.

The show system command lists the attributes such as the hostname, boot time, current date and time, and domain name.

sonic# show system
-----------------------------------------------------------
Attribute            Value/State
-----------------------------------------------------------
Hostname            :Leaf3
Boot Time           :1577362334
Current Datetime    :2020-01-08T16:44:22Z+00:00
Domain Name         :None

The show system memory command provides details on the total available memory and the used memory.

sonic# show system memory
-----------------------------------------------------------
Attribute            Value/State
-----------------------------------------------------------
Used                :2951756
Total               :8162428

The CLI supports many configuration commands. Access the configuration mode by using the command configure terminal.

sonic(config)# ?
  aaa             AAA configuration
  bfd             Configure BFD peers
  bgp             bgp command list
  end             Exit to the exec Mode
  evpn            EVPN Global Configuration
  exit            Exit from current mode
  interface       Select an interface
  ip              Global IP configuration subcommands
  ipv6            ipv6 prefix-list
  kdump           kdump command
  link            Create link state tracking group
  mclag           domain
  mirror-session  Mirror session configuration
  ***** OUTPUT TRUNCATED ******

Management Framework CLI use case example

Various use cases are associated with the Management Framework CLI. The CLI allows a user to configure the Enterprise SONiC Distribution by Dell Technologies for enterprise and scalable use cases. One use case for an enterprise data center uses ZTP to configure several switches simultaneously. To do that, the ZTP service must be enabled on the NOS. The ZTP service is enabled by default when the NOS boots. If the service is disabled, use the ztp enable CLI command to reenable the service.

Another use case example relates to a scalable architecture in the enterprise data center. The Layer 3 leaf-spine architecture model requires the configuration of the leaf and spine switches, with the Layer 2 and Layer 3 boundary defined at the leaf switches.

Figure 10: Assigning IP addresses on switch Leaf1 using the CLI

The following example shows the initial configuration steps for assigning an IP address to a loopback interface, and point-to-point interfaces in switch Leaf 1 within the leaf-spine topology shown in the previous figure.

interface Loopback 0
ip address 10.0.2.1/32
exit

interface Ethernet 0
description To-Spine1
ip address 192.168.1.1/31
no shutdown
exit

interface Ethernet 4
description To-Spine2
ip address 192.168.2.1/31
no shutdown
exit

interface Ethernet 12
description To-Dynamic-neighbor
ip address 50.50.50.2/24
no shutdown
exit