Logging in via a script to a remote server and execute a set of commands

Question

How can I login to a remote server and execute a set of commands then when done logout and continue my script?

Thanks.

Answer 1

ssh can be used to execute a command, rather than start a remote interactive login shell. For example:

ssh user@host ls

Will log into host and execute the ls command.

You can use this inside a bash script as normal:

#!/bin/bash

# do local commands

ssh user@host "ls; grep something file.txt; copy a b"

# do more local commands

From ssh's man page, the exit status will be the exit status of the remove command or 255 if an error occurred.

Answer 2

Small variation with easier code formatting using ssh and bash -s:

echo '
globchar="*"
ls -1d $globchar
ls -ld $globchar
' |
ssh user@host "bash -s --"