PacketPilot Config — Overview

PacketPilot Config is a Windows desktop application for network engineers who need to manage, configure, and audit network devices at scale.

What it does:

Browser-based SSH terminal for switches, routers, and firewalls
Serial console access via USB-to-serial adapters
Automated device discovery on a subnet
Bulk configuration operations across hundreds of devices at once
Vendor-specific bootstrap wizards for initial device setup (Cisco, Aruba, Arista, Juniper)
Config capture and export for use in PacketPilot Analyze

What it doesn't do:

AI analysis (that's Analyze's role)
Packet capture or traffic analysis
Wireless or cloud-managed device management

Key Features

Multi-Vendor SSH

Connect to any device that accepts SSH connections. Credentials are stored locally and never leave your network.

Supported vendors (SSH):

Cisco IOS / NX-OS
Juniper JunOS
Arista EOS
HPE ProCurve / Aruba (AOS-Switch)
Generic SSH2-compatible devices

Serial Console

The console tab provides direct serial access to devices via USB-to-serial adapters. Useful for:

Initial device setup when SSH is not yet configured
Password recovery procedures
Devices with SSH disabled

The serial engine is vendor-neutral. It communicates over any COM port at any baud rate. Vendor profiles (Cisco, Aruba, Arista, Juniper) provide login prompt detection and bootstrap wizards.

Device Discovery

Scan a subnet to find active network devices. Config automatically identifies the vendor based on SSH banner and sysdesc responses. Devices are added to the inventory with vendor context applied.

Bulk Operations

Select multiple devices in the inventory and push configuration changes simultaneously. Changes are applied in parallel. A rollback option reverts changes if any device reports an error.

Config Backups

Schedule automatic daily configuration backups. Every backup is stored locally with a timestamp. You can restore any previous version or compare two backups diff-style.

How Config Fits into the PacketPilot Workflow

PacketPilot Config          PacketPilot Analyze
┌──────────────────┐       ┌──────────────────┐
│                  │       │                  │
│  SSH / Console ──┼──────►│  Findings import │
│                  │ export │                  │
│  Capture configs │       │  Deterministic    │
│  Run diagnostics │       │  AI root-cause    │
│                  │       │  (local Ollama)   │
└──────────────────┘       └──────────────────┘

Config handles device interaction. Analyze handles the analysis. They are separate products — you can use either one without the other.

System Requirements

| Requirement | Details | |------------|---------| | OS | Windows 10 or Windows 11 | | CPU | Any modern x86_64 processor | | RAM | 4 GB minimum, 8 GB recommended | | Disk | 200 MB for installation | | Connectivity | None required (fully offline) | | Other | USB-to-serial driver for console access |

Licensing

PacketPilot Config uses a 30-day machine-bound local trial.

Trial starts on first launch
Tied to the machine's hardware ID (Windows MachineGuid)
Reinstalling the app does not reset the trial
After the trial expires: a license key is required to continue

See Licensing and Trial for full details on how the trial works and how to activate a license.

overview