US Patent 11503027 Validating configuration changes on a network device

A technique to manage a configuration database (CDB) for a network device is disclosed. Network devices may receive a configuration change request as a configuration change object. To process that request, a current configuration CLI set representative of the current CDB may be generated. The network device creates a shadow CDB initially corresponding to the current CDB and processes the change request against the shadow CDB. An updated configuration CLI set may then be generated from the updated shadow CDB. A differential CLI set indicating the difference between the first CLI set and the second CLI set may be generated to represent a set of CLI commands to transition from one CDB to the other (e.g., implement the request). Authorization of the user to execute the CLI commands of the differential CLI dataset may be verified. Upon verification, the current CDB may be replaced with the updated shadow CDB.