Cisco Packet Tracer's device deployment interface organizes network components into six categories—network devices, end devices, components, connections, miscellaneous, and multi-user—each with context-sensitive submenus for precise selection. Devices are added to the workspace by dragging from the panel and can be removed using the delete tool, undone with standard undo/redo controls, or inspected by hovering.
Deploying Devices in Packet Tracer
Here on the bottom section right here, this is where I have a bunch of different items that we can deploy. First of all, we need to know that there are a lot of different items that we can deploy, and there's kind of a menu structure with this. This is the top menu. Here we see one, two, three, four, five, six different categories.
The first one, if I hover over it, it says network devices, and so we have network devices. In fact, Control Alt R looks like something that we can bring up that menu item with. Next one over we've got end devices for our network. Next one over we got components. Next one we've got connections, and then miscellaneous. And finally we've just got a multi-user connection, which once again we're not going to get in depth into.
And then from here we have the submenu, and the submenu is going to change depending on what we've selected up here. So for our network devices we've got routers, we've got switches, we've got hubs, wireless devices, security, and we've got WAN emulations. And then if I select now the end devices, we can see that there's different stuff here that we can select: end devices, the Home, Smart City.
And now, depending on what I select — so if I select here and I have routers, you'll see now I have a selection of routers to select from. And then if I select switches, then I've got a selection of switches. Or if I do end devices, we have our end devices here, we have laptops and PCs. Or if I want to do some smart home stuff, then I've got some smart home items that I can add. So here's a lot of different stuff that we can select in here to set up these devices.
First of all, what I want to do is maybe I want to set up a router. So what I have here is I have network devices and routers selected, and now I've got my list of routers. I select the router that I want, and all I have to do is drag that onto my screen, and there we have it — this 2911 is now on my screen. Or maybe I want multiple 2911s, so I can pull those out, and now they're set up on my screen.
Maybe I want a switch, so I'm going to select a switch. I'm going to set up for my network over here a 3650 with a couple of 2960s. And then same thing over here, maybe I want a 2960 over here on this side. So this is kind of forming my network that I'm going to create here.
And then perhaps what I want is an end device so I can do some testing, so I'm going to set up a PC right here. So I can start setting up my different devices on here.
Now perhaps I didn't want some of these devices, and maybe I want to go through and delete them. So I have this delete right here that I can click, delete, and then start clicking on the equipment that I want to delete, and I can go through and delete some of these devices. So that's how I could remove them from the screen.
As in with most programs, if I want to undo something, I have the undo button that I can undo something, or the redo, where I can redo that delete, or redo whatever action I have.
If I have the delete tool selected and I want to do away with it, all I have to do is go back to the select tool, and now I have the select tool and click on any of these devices that I want to select. I also can see additional information if I hover over these different devices.
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