Cisco IOS Archive Feature

‘Archive’ is an underrated feature of Cisco IOS/IOS-XE present since IOS 12.4(20)T. It enables you to take a snapshot of a configuration just like the ‘Checkpoint’ Feature on Cisco NX-OS and allows you to store it as an archive file. Ideally these archives can be stored in the root directory of Flash memory on a Cisco IOS device.

By default, the router can store 10 archives. Command maximum <1–14> can be used either to restrict the number of archives or configure it to max limit which is 14. It is recommended to restrict the archive to 1 especially if archive feature is configured for auto backup of configuration.

The feature when implemented can be useful not only for troubleshooting purposes but also extremely useful when dealing with configuration changes where remote management access is at risk. The archive feature enables you to trigger a timer based automatic rollback of configuration and IOS does this rollback without reloading the router.

Scheduled Rollback with Archive Feature
Step 1: Verify if Archive feature is enabled or not with show archive command

Step 2: Enabling and configuring Archive feature. Command archive in global config mode enables this feature. Command path <directory> sets the path where archive config would be stored.

Step 3: Scheduling Rollback. Command configure terminal revert timer <Minutes> schedules the rollback for you. The timer can be set for 1–120 Minutes.

Note that Cisco IOS immediately creates the archive of current running-config on its own.

Now proceed with your configuration as normal. I have added a few loopback interfaces here to demonstrate this feature.

Scenario 1: You lose remote management access at this point for any reason whatsoever. The timer will ensure that configuration is rolled back to the previous running config stored as an archive.

Scenario 2: You wish to keep your configuration and abort the scheduled rollback. In such case, at any point before the rollback timer time outs one can confirm the newly configured configuration with command configure confirm.

Note: Command configure confirm is not a replacement for write-memory command. You still need to save your config onto NVRAM.

Related Commands

show archive config rollback timer: Shows the rollback timer details.
config revert timer <minutes>: Lets you reconfigure/extend your rollback timer.
more <directory:filename>: shows the complete configuration stored in a particular archive.
show archive config differences <directory:filename> <directory:filename>: shows config differences between two archives.
archive config: When executed in Exec Privileged mode lets you manually archive the current startup-config.