Paste multiple commands to Putty - process serially?

Question

I have about 3000 individual commands that I need to execute on a system via Putty. I am doing this by copying ~100 of the commands and pasting them into a putty SSH session. It works, however the issue is that Putty does not process them serially and the output gets garbled.

Is there a way to make Putty process each command, wait for a return and then process the next? The Windows command prompt does this and I'm thinking there is a way to do so with Putty.

Yes, I know I could put this in a bash script, but due to circumstance outside my control, this has to be done using SSH and in a manner that can be monitored as we go and logged.

Answer 1

I do this all the time. Put your commands in a ( ) block, which will run it as a subshell, perfectly everything within serially. I'm running Windows PuTTY and connecting to Linux and AIX servers. Try it.

(
Command1
Command2
Command3
)

In practice, I might have a huge load of many 100s of statements I want to run, in Notepad++ or whatever. So I copy them to clipboard, and then in PuTTY:

(   
 paste in your wad here
)

EDIT: If you want to log the output from each of your statements individually, you might do something like this:

(
Command1 > /home/jon/command1output.txt
Command2 > /home/jon/command2output.txt
Command3 > /home/jon/command3output.txt
)

or if you just want one big stream of output, you could interleave separators for easier reading later:

(
echo "~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~"
echo "[`date`]  Now running Command1 ..."
Command1
echo "~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~"
echo "[`date`]  Now running Command2 ..."
Command2
echo "~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~"
echo "[`date`]  Now running Command3 ..."
Command3
)

EDIT2: Another variation using an inline function. All paste-able into PuTTY, with perfect serial running, logging as command1:output1,command2:output2,... , and capable of driving SQL*Plus.

(
  function geniusMagic() {
    echo " "
    echo "~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~"
    date
    echo "RUNNING COMMAND:"
    echo " "
    echo "$*"
    echo " "
    echo "OUTPUT:"    
    echo " "
    sh -c "$*"
  }

  geniusMagic df -m /home
  geniusMagic 'printf $RANDOM | sed "s/0//g"'
  geniusMagic 'echo "select count(*)
                     FROM all_tables;
                 " | sqlplus -s scott/tiger'
)

Sample output:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Wed Jun 25 17:41:19 EDT 2014
RUNNING COMMAND:

df -m /home

OUTPUT:

Filesystem    MB blocks      Free %Used    Iused %Iused Mounted on
/dev/hd1        1024.00    508.49   51%     3164     3% /home

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Wed Jun 25 17:41:19 EDT 2014
RUNNING COMMAND:

printf $RANDOM | sed "s/0//g"

OUTPUT:

2767
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Wed Jun 25 17:41:19 EDT 2014
RUNNING COMMAND:

echo "select count(*)
                     FROM all_tables;
                 " | sqlplus -s scott/tiger

OUTPUT:


  COUNT(*)
----------
        48