Soliton control and management using generalized external potentials in an inhomogeneous fiber to the design of high speed optical devices and ultrahigh capacity transmission systems are investigated based on solving the variable-coefficient generalized nonautonomous nonlinear Schrodinger equation with the help of symbolic computation. We construct Lax pair for GNLS equation by means of AKNS method and two soliton solutions are obtained by virtue of the Darboux transformation. With symbolic computation, we manipulate the control parameters and external potentials to investigate the propagation behaviors of nonautonomous solitons. Moreover, the main evolution features of obtained two soliton solutions are exposed by some interesting figures through computer simulation. Especially, we analyze the influence of external potentials such as periodic, exponential and parabolic potential on soliton propagation. Finally, soliton propagation under the absence (vanishing) of external potential is also discussed. Obtained results confirmed that external potentials has strong influence on the soliton dynamics. Our results might provide a new method to achieve the soliton pulse compression while they passing through the potential barrier or well under the influence of external potentials. (C) 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.