Fortinet Enhancements - Multiple VDOMs

[tcb678]

In an environment where a Fortinet has multiple VDOMs, there's the beginning of some assertions that imply Netmiko is at least loosely aware of a multiple-VDOM case. In an environment I work in, I log in to an FGT-ABC-DEF # prompt, but much of the configuration is abstracted into individual VDOMs, such that many commands I run have me running config vdom and then edit <X> to put me in the correct context. Once in FGT-ABC-DEF (ACTUAL VDOM), which comes after FGT-ABC-DEF (vdom), I can in my version (7.4.x+) run sudo <vdom> <command> to run commands in different VDOMs directly. This works well. Sadly, this sequence isn't handled well by Netmiko, partially because of the changing prompt. A solid regex e.g. r"[A-Za-z0-9][\w\-]*(?:\s*\([^)]*\))?\s*[#>]\s*$" gets me part of the way there, but I think Netmiko could see some enhancements here; just what enhancements I'm not sure. It could be that better prompt handling is all that's needed. I've played with a few different approaches but rather than be cavalier and submit a PR, I thought it might make sense to evaluate whether Netmiko should be smarter about multiple VDOMs and the interactions between them. Items to consider:

• You cannot "directly" switch between VDOMs without ending e.g. no edit <X>; edit <Y> because once you are in a given VDOM, you have limited awareness of other VDOMs. You can do next or end, though the actual impacts are variable depending on whether you have actually changed configurations or not.
• You can sudo to another VDOM e.g. sudo VDOM2 show full-configuration.
• You can sudo from config global provided you have access to do so.
• In a managed fortiswitch environment, some environments don't permit logging in directly to the switch you care about; but many Fortiswitch commands are only available when connected directly to that switch. This may be a wontfix but it might be useful to consider the situation where you may want to run, for instance, execute ssh username@fsw-01 to run a command on a specific switch in a managed Fortiswitch deployment.

Just thought I'd start some of the discussion here in hopes for an eventual PR.

[ktbyers]

@tcb678 It would probably be best if we pick a specific issue and look at that--which issue is most important to you?

It would be very helpful if you put the actual CLI illustrating the issue here (as I do not have a Fortinet device).