1. An apparatus for automatically configuring a network device, comprising: one or more processors; and one or more stored sequences of instructions which, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform: receiving a request from the network device to provide configuration information; retrieving a template describing a device configuration, wherein the template associates one symbolic reference to one parameter, wherein the parameter may receive values specific to particular devices; based at least on the symbolic reference and the request, retrieving a value of the parameter that is specific to the network device; and creating and storing a device-specific instance of the configuration information based at least on the template and the value of the parameter, wherein the configuration information is stored in Extensible Markup Language (XML) format and conforms to an XML Document Type Definition (DTD).