Automating Telnet or SSH

Hi,

I am currently developing a scripting language for automating Telnet and
SSH sessions, and the code is now starting to get ready.

I would like to request the comments of network administrators - what
features would like in such a software? I am particularly interested in
comments on the syntax, as I want to make it as clear and easy as
possible to automate a session.

An overview over the language can be seen here:
http://code.google.com/p/exscript/wiki/LanguageSyntax

The project page is here:
http://code.google.com/p/exscript/

-Samuel

On 2007-09-12, Samuel <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>
> I am currently developing a scripting language for automating Telnet and
> SSH sessions, and the code is now starting to get ready.
>
> I would like to request the comments of network administrators - what
> features would like in such a software? I am particularly interested in
> comments on the syntax, as I want to make it as clear and easy as
> possible to automate a session.

This isn't a syntax issue, but a way to specify multiple hosts on which
to execute the exscript script would probably be useful.

I'm also a bit puzzled as to what Exscript provides that, say, using the
Perl Net::SSH or Net::SSH::Perl modules do not (or, for simple tasks,
even a hack of copying over a shell script and executing with
ssh/telnet).

--keith


--
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(try just my userid to email me)
AOLSFAQ=http://www.therockgarden.ca/aolsfaq.txt
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On Wed, 12 Sep 2007 14:00:20 -0700, Keith Keller wrote:

> This isn't a syntax issue, but a way to specify multiple hosts on which
> to execute the exscript script would probably be useful.

This is already supported in the following ways:

1.
$ ./exscript.py my.exscript host1 host2 host3

2.
$ cat my_hosts
host1
host2
host3
$ ./exscript.py my.exscript --hosts my_hosts

3.
$ cat my_hosts
hostname description
host1 one
host2 two
host3 three
$ ./exscript.py my.exscript --csv-hosts my_hosts

A complete list of command line options is here:
http://code.google.com/p/exscript/wi...mandLineSyntax

> I'm also a bit puzzled as to what Exscript provides that, say, using the
> Perl Net::SSH or Net::SSH::Perl modules do not (or, for simple tasks,
> even a hack of copying over a shell script and executing with
> ssh/telnet).

I used Perl exclusively before creating Exscript (and long before that,
Expect), so I believe to know it very well. In fact, earlier (unreleased)
versions of Exscript were just wrappers around Perl's Net::Telnet. You
have to admit that it is a *lot* more work to create an equivalent Perl
script, even when ignoring error handling and logging in Perl (both comes
for free in Exscript).
Also, in Exscript, you get parallelization for free (see the -c command
line switch). This is simply a major pita in both, Perl and Expect, and
one of the reasons I wrote Exscript.

Thanks for your comments.

-Samuel

On 2007-09-12, Samuel <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
> On Wed, 12 Sep 2007 14:00:20 -0700, Keith Keller wrote:
>
>> This isn't a syntax issue, but a way to specify multiple hosts on which
>> to execute the exscript script would probably be useful.
>
> This is already supported in the following ways:

[snip]

> A complete list of command line options is here:
> http://code.google.com/p/exscript/wi...mandLineSyntax

Great--I did look at the command line syntax, but not very thoroughly.

>> I'm also a bit puzzled as to what Exscript provides that, say, using the
>> Perl Net::SSH or Net::SSH::Perl modules do not (or, for simple tasks,
>> even a hack of copying over a shell script and executing with
>> ssh/telnet).
>
> I used Perl exclusively before creating Exscript (and long before that,
> Expect), so I believe to know it very well. In fact, earlier (unreleased)
> versions of Exscript were just wrappers around Perl's Net::Telnet. You
> have to admit that it is a *lot* more work to create an equivalent Perl
> script, even when ignoring error handling and logging in Perl (both comes
> for free in Exscript).
> Also, in Exscript, you get parallelization for free (see the -c command
> line switch). This is simply a major pita in both, Perl and Expect, and
> one of the reasons I wrote Exscript.

Again, great. I'll take a closer look.

--keith

--
kkeller-(E-Mail Removed)
(try just my userid to email me)
AOLSFAQ=http://www.therockgarden.ca/aolsfaq.txt
see X- headers for PGP signature information

On Sep 12, 3:17 pm, Samuel <newsgro...@debain.org> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I am currently developing a scripting language for automating Telnet and
> SSH sessions, and the code is now starting to get ready.
>
> I would like to request the comments of network administrators - what
> features would like in such a software? I am particularly interested in
> comments on the syntax, as I want to make it as clear and easy as
> possible to automate a session.
>
> An overview over the language can be seen here:http://code.google.com/p/exscript/wiki/LanguageSyntax
>
> The project page is here:http://code.google.com/p/exscript/
>
> -Samuel

Full, simply written, EXPLICIT and real world useful documentation.
With all syntax explained and useful real world examples. And good
trouble shooting sections.

I have not seen a competently documented software package in years
now.

So-so software with excellent documentation is far better than
excellent software poorly documented.

Cheerful Charlie