Usage Examples

Run a command as a different user

on hosts do |host|
  as 'www-data' do
    puts capture(:whoami)
  end
end

Run with default environemntal variables

SSHKit.config.default_env = { path: '/usr/local/libexec/bin:$PATH' }
on hosts do |host|
  puts capture(:env)
end

Run a command in a different directory

on hosts do |host|
  within '/var/log' do
    puts capture(:head, '-n5', 'messages')
  end
end

Run a command with specific environmental variables

on hosts do |host|
  with rack_env: :test do
    puts capture("env | grep RACK_ENV")
  end
end

Run a command in a different directory as a different user

on hosts do |host|
  as 'www-data' do
    in '/var/log' do
      puts capture(:whoami)
      puts capture(:pwd)
    end
  end
end

This will output:

www-data
/var/log

Note: This example is a bit misleading, as the www-data user doesn't have a shell defined, one cannot switch to that user.

Stack directory nestings

on hosts do
  in "/var" do
    puts capture(:pwd)
    in :log do
      puts capture(:pwd)
    end
  end
end

This will output:

/var/
/var/log

The directory paths are joined using File.join(), which should correctly join parts without forcing the user of the code to care about trailing or leading slashes. It may be misleading as the File.join() is performed on the machine running the code, if that's a Windows box, the paths may be incorrectly joined according to the expectations of the machine receiving the commands.

Running a task in the background

on hosts do
  in '/opt/sites/example.com' do
    background :rails, :server
  end
end

This will run something like nohup /usr/bin/env rails server > /dev/null &, backgrounding the Rails process, and making sure we don't leave nohup log files littering the filesystem.

Note: The background() method won't do what you expect if you pass a string sleep 5, according to the rules of processing commands, you must call background(:sleep, "5") (that is, command: sleep, args: 5).

Further Note: The background() task wraps the given command in nohup .... & under some circumstances the program will hang anyway when the SSH session exits.

Do not care about the host block

on hosts do
  # The |host| argument is optional, it will
  # be nil in the block if not passed
end

Redirect all output to /dev/null

SSHKit.config.output = File.open('/dev/null')

Implement a dirt-simple formatter class

class MyFormatter < SSHKit::Formatter::Abstract
  def write(obj)
    case obj.is_a? SSHKit::Command
      # Do something here, see the SSHKit::Command documentation
    end
  end
end

SSHKit.config.output = MyFormatter.new($stdout)
SSHKit.config.output = MyFormatter.new(SSHKit.config.output)
SSHKit.config.output = MyFormatter.new(File.open('log/deploy.log', 'wb'))

Set a password for a host.

host = SSHKit::Host.new('user@example.com')
host.password = "hackme"

on host do |host|
  puts capture(:echo, "I don't care about security!")
end

Execute and raise an error if something goes wrong

on hosts do |host|
  execute!(:echo, '"Example Message!" 1>&2; false')
end

This will raise SSHKit::Command:Failed with the #message "Example Message!"` which will cause the command to abort.

Make a test, or run a command which may fail without raising an error:

on hosts do |host
  if test "[ -d /opt/sites ]" do
    within "/opt/sites" do
      execute :git, :pull
    end
  else
    execute :git, :clone, 'some-repository', '/opt/sites'
  end
end

The test() command behaves exactly the same as execute however will return false if the command exits with a non-zero exit (as man 1 test does). As ti returns boolean it can be used to direct the control flow within the block.

Do something different on one host, or another depending on a host property

host1 = SSHKit::Host.new 'user@example.com'
host2 = SSHKit::Host.new 'user@example.org'

on hosts do |host|
  target = "/var/www/sites/"
  if host.hostname =~ /org/
    target += "dotorg"
  else
    target += "dotcom"
  end
  execute! :git, :clone, "git@git.#{host.hostname}", target
end

Connect to a host in the easiest possible way

on 'example.com' do |host|
  execute :uptime
end

This will resolve the example.com hostname into a SSHKit::Host object, and try to pull up the correct configuration for it.

Run a command without it being command-mapped

If the command you attempt to call contains a space character it won't be mapped:

Command.new(:git, :push, :origin, :master).to_s
# => /usr/bin/env git push origin master
# (also: execute(:git, :push, :origin, :master)

Command.new("git push origin master").to_s
# => git push origin master
# (also: execute("git push origin master"))

This can be used to access shell builtins (such as if and test)

Run a command with a heredoc

An extension of the behaviour above, if you write a command like this:

c = Command.new <<-EOCOMMAND
  if test -d /var/log
  then echo "Directory Exists"
  fi
EOCOMMAND
c.to_s
# => if test -d /var/log; then echo "Directory Exists; fi
# (also: execute <<- EOCOMMAND........))

Note: The logic which reformats the script into a oneliner may be naïve, but in all known test cases, it works. The key thing is that if is not mapped to /usr/bin/env if, which would break with a syntax error.

 Using with Rake

Into the Rakefile simply put something like:

require 'sshkit/dsl'

SSHKit.config.command_map[:rake] = "./bin/rake"

desc "Deploy the site, pulls from Git, migrate the db and precompile assets, then restart Passenger."
task :deploy do
  on "example.com" do |host|
    within "/opt/sites/example.com" do
      execute :git, :pull
      execute :bundle, :install, '--deployment'
      execute :rake, 'db:migrate'
      execute :rake, 'assets:precompile'
      execute :touch, 'tmp/restart.txt'
    end
  end
end

Using without the DSL

The Coordinator will resolve all hosts into Host objects, you can mix and match.

Coordinator.new("one.example.com", SSHKit::Host.new('two.example.com')).each in: :sequence do
  puts capture :uptime
end

You might also look at ./lib/sshkit/dsl.rb where you can see almost the exact code as above, which implements the on() method.

Use the Host properties attribute

Implemented since v0.0.6

servers = %w{one.example.com two.example.com
             three.example.com four.example.com}.collect do |s|
  h = SSHKit::Host.new(s)
  if s.match /(one|two)/
    h.properties.roles = [:web]
  else
    h.properties.roles = [:app]
  end
end

on servers do |host|
  if host.properties.roles.include?(:web)
    # Do something pertinent to web servers
  elsif host.properties.roles.include?(:app)
    # Do something pertinent to application servers
  end
end

The SSHKit::Host#properties is an OpenStruct which is not verified or validated in any way, it is up to you, or your library to attach meanings or conventions to this mechanism.