Using The Cisco Pix Device Manager

The complexity of the many services and features offered by the Cisco PIX firewall appliance can make configuration from the console a daunting task even for someone who is familiar with the Cisco IOS. Because a firewall is only as good as its configuration, security may suffer if the PIX is configured poorly due to a lack of skill with the command-line interface. Fortunately, Cisco has provided a GUI tool called the PIX Device Manager (PDM) that allows secure configuration, management, and monitoring from a browser. Despite the bad reputation of many vendors' past attempts to port command-line interfaces to graphical interfaces, Cisco PDM version 2.02 integrates most commands supported on the PIX very robustly. In addition to providing an effective tool to configure, manage, and monitor a PIX firewall, the Cisco PDM can improve security by making these tasks more understandable for the firewall administrator. This paper examines the PDM starting with an overview of the PIX, requirements of the PDM software, initial configuration guide, and finally a walkthrough of the software.