Add Cisco IOL devices to GNS3 on macOS

Cisco recently made the Cisco IOL images publicly available via their Cisco Modeling Labs (CML) subscription. This post provides the steps of how to add them to GNS3 on macOS.

Prerequisites

• Cisco Modeling Labs subscription
• GNS3 on Apple Silicon
• GNS3 client

Steps

1. Point your web browser to the CML Software Download page.

2. Click the Download icon for Cisco Modeling Labs reference platform ISO file (February 2024).

3. Log in with your Cisco.com credentials when prompted.

4. Save the refplat-20240225-fcs-iso.zip file to your Downloads folder.

5. Open your favorite terminal emulator.

6. Change to the Downloads directory.

cd ~/Downloads

7. Create the cml27-refplat directory.

mkdir -p cml27-refplat

8. Uncompress the refplat-20240225-fcs-iso.zip file into the cml27-refplatdirectory.

unzip refplat-20240225-fcs-iso.zip -d cml27-refplat

9. Attach the refplat-20240225-fcs.iso file.

open cml27-refplat/refplat-20240225-fcs.iso

10. Create the IOU directory.

mkdir -p ~/GNS3/images/IOU

11. Copy the IOL L2 image to the IOU directory.

cp /Volumes/REFPLAT/virl-base-images/ioll2-xe-17-12-01/x86_64_crb_linux_l2-adventerprisek9-ms ~/GNS3/images/IOU

12. Copy the IOL image to the IOU directory.

cp /Volumes/REFPLAT/virl-base-images/iol-xe-17-12-01/x86_64_crb_linux-adventerprisek9-ms ~/GNS3/images/IOU

13. Detach the REFPLAT image file from Finder.

14. Open the GNS3 client application.

15. Click the Settings button.

16. Select IOU Devices on the left side menu.

17. Click the New button.

18. Enter IOL XE L2 for the Name value.

19. Select L2 image for Type.

20. Click the Browse… button.

21. Navigate to and select the x86_64_crb_linux_l2-adventerprisek9-ms file.

    • Click the Show Options button.
    • Use All file (*) in the file extension drop-down menu.

22. Click the Open button.

23. Click the Finish button after the upload completes.

24. Click the Edit button.

25. Enter SW{0} for the Default name format value.

26. Enter :/symbols/affinity/square/blue/switch_multilayer.svg for the Symbol value.

27. Click the OK button.

28. Click the Apply button to save the template configuration.

29. Click the New button.

30. Enter IOL XE for the Name value.

31. Select L3 image for Type.

32. Click the Browse… button.

33. Navigate to and select the x86_64_crb_linux-adventerprisek9-ms file.

    • Click the Show Options button.
    • Use All file (*) in the file extension drop-down menu.

34. Click the Open button.

35. Click the Finish button after the upload completes.

36. Click the Edit button.

37. Enter R{0} for the Default name format value.

38. Enter :/symbols/affinity/circle/blue/router2.svg for the Symbol value.

39. Click the OK button.

40. Click the OK button to save and close the Preferences window.