automatically configurating multiple wireless routers

[thorasine]

Hi all;

We recently got an order from a customer (a wireless ISP), they need an app to configure the wireless section in their clients' routers.

As I was thinking about the easiest way to implement this (knowing how a router can be configured - by telneting and logging in, or by http) I came up with this idea:

Most of the modern routers have a HTTP configuration interface, which means the admin opens a browser and points it to http://192.168.1.1 or whatever, depending on router make, model and/or configuration. Then, he is requested to provide authentication credentials - username and password, in order to access the configuration screens. Which are simple HTML pages, containing simple HTML forms and tags, which POST the information the admin is filling in, to the router, to a small CGI-like routine.
SO, knowing for each router model how the HTML pages look like, we could clone this set-up process by calling the router with the appropiate http POSTs with the appropiate variables. There are 5, maybe 6 variables that need to be posted in order to configure the wireless section of the router.
So our application-thingie needs the user to fill in router ip, router make/model, and login username and password.
At the time we process user input, we already know (by his selection on router make/model) how to POST the settings.

This seems to me like a very simple way to approach this, a lot simpler than uploading config settings via TFTP or whatever (don't forget that we're doing this from a Delphi application).

Now, does anyone have any suggestions? Comments? I would really appreciate it.

Thank you.