In one embodiment, a method for interfacing between a command-line-interface (CLI)-based application program (CLI-AP) residing in a client network device, and remote network devices. The method includes predefining at least one CLI-based program routine (CLI-PR) comprising at least one CLI-based command wherein the CLI-PR is defined externally to the CLI-AP, determining by CLI-AP a set of data to be obtained from the remote network device; selecting by CLI-AP a predefined CLI-PR from the predefined CLI-PRs, the selected predefined CLI-PR corresponding to the remote network device and determined set of data to be obtained; instructing the client network device by CLI-AP to execute the selected predefined CLI-PR, wherein executing selected predefined PR will cause the selected predefined CLI-PR to obtain the determined set of data from remote network device and to configure the obtained data in a predetermined format; and querying configured data by CLI-AP to retrieve the determined set of data.