Using The Command-Line Interface; Information About Using The Command-Line Interface; Command Modes; Chapter - Cisco Catalyst 2960 series Configuration Manual

Using the Command-Line Interface

This chapter contains the following topics:
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Information About Using the Command-Line Interface

This section describes the Cisco IOS command-line interface (CLI) and how to use it to configure your switch.

Command Modes

The Cisco IOS user interface is divided into many different modes. The commands available to you depend
on which mode you are currently in. Enter a question mark (?) at the system prompt to obtain a list of commands
available for each command mode.
You can start a CLI session through a console connection, through Telnet, a SSH, or by using the browser.
When you start a session, you begin in user mode, often called user EXEC mode. Only a limited subset of
the commands are available in user EXEC mode. For example, most of the user EXEC commands are one-time
commands, such as show commands, which show the current configuration status, and clear commands,
which clear counters or interfaces. The user EXEC commands are not saved when the switch reboots.
To have access to all commands, you must enter privileged EXEC mode. Normally, you must enter a password
to enter privileged EXEC mode. From this mode, you can enter any privileged EXEC command or enter
global configuration mode.
Using the configuration modes (global, interface, and line), you can make changes to the running configuration.
If you save the configuration, these commands are stored and used when the switch reboots. To access the
various configuration modes, you must start at global configuration mode. From global configuration mode,
you can enter interface configuration mode and line configuration mode.
This table describes the main command modes, how to access each one, the prompt you see in that mode, and
how to exit the mode.
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Information About Using the Command-Line Interface, page 1
How to Use the CLI to Configure Features, page 5
Catalyst 2960-X Switch VLAN Configuration Guide, Cisco IOS Release 15.0(2)EX
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