When you see the word 'shutdown' in the output of a 'show running-config' command on a Cisco router... what does that exactly indicate?
My basic assumption would be that it means that interface is shutdown and not operating. Is there more to it than that?
No you're right.
shutdown basically means that a interface is.. You guessed it! Shutdown.
no shutdown on the other hand means that the interface has been brought up.
Shutdown doesn't only operate on interfaces, for example EIGRP when configured with IPv6 it is per default in shutdown mode.
An interface in shutdown means the interface is administratively down.
Cisco device interfaces have two "down" modes, both of which influence the actual working mode of the interface: if either is "down", then no traffic is possible.
The shutdown command puts the device in administratively down mode, while a network-level error or disconnected cable puts it in "line down" mode.
The actual status of each interface can be seen with show interface status
shutdown has also some other usages:
If BGP peer is shutdown:
Router# show run | section bgp
router bgp 65001
neighbor 172.22.16.3 remote-as 65002
neighbor 172.22.16.3 shutdown
Some IOSes can also be a h323 gatekeeper, which can be shutdown:
Router# show run | begin gatekeeper
gatekeeper
shutdown
