Is there a way to automate opening a bunch of frequently used SSH sessions all at once on a Linux based workstation? I'd like to type a single command and wind up with a single terminal window having three tabs.
Tab 1 would be labeled "web-logs" and would [upon connection] have a "tail -F" of my nginx logs.
Tab 2 would be labeled "mail-logs" and would [upon connection] have a "tail -F" of my postfix logs.
Tab 3 would be labeled "lily" and would have a typical interactive session to my minetest server.
I am currently using Asbru Connection Manager which works great, but I'd like to think I could do this with a simple terminal window. Am I wrong?
Hopefully I didn't miss anyone. This is an example of what my little xdotool script does right now. I am going to run it side-by-side with asbru for a bit and see how it works out. The general idea of the script is:
I hope so... it is still a little clumsy though. For example, I am finding that one of my servers is slightly slower than the others to respond and I have to adjust the delays between typing. So if I had a server down or a significant delay, the xdo "typing" has no way to "notice" the problem and slow itself down.
Yeah, those delays make it uncomfortably sensitive to timing. It'll also break if you type anything else on the keyboard while it's running. And it won't work on Wayland.
If you haven't already, you might want to check if LXTerminal has a command-line option or D-Bus API to add new tabs and run specific commands on them, like Konsole does. If so, that would avoid all the issues with the xdotool approach.
@argv_minus_one lxterminal DOES have command line args to open a new tab, in fact multiple tabs... however, there does not seem to be a way to inject a command in to more than one of those tabs. Which strikes me as quite odd. It would be awesome if I could just run
I should also mention that my "old" solution [Asbru Connection Manager] actually does use regexp strings for "expected replies" and has default ones with sane values that allow it to compensate and provide a much smarter and more interactive type of login process.
I actually tried it that way and it would only tail the last ten lines (yes I had a -F) and then exit. With the little one-line script on the server it works fine for some reason. :-(
My setup is pretty basic... a Devuan base install, xorg and openbox, with lxterminal. I just tried a bunch more combinations with various quotes and couldn't get it to go at all. :-(
@jmhorner I think Tabby may have a way to do this, or at least reopen the last group of tabs you had open when you last ran the program ("Restore terminal tabs on app start" setting).
@oblomov Of course I can establish an easy-to-connect single session with just key based auth and a ~/.ssh/config file. The trouble is in getting new tabs to open in my terminal window, each with a specific tab-name and a different SSH connection in it. tmux tabs exist, but are [IMO] clumsy compared to term window tabs. I'm sure there are CLI lovers who would call me lazy for not wanting to commit tmux tab navigation keystrokes to muscle memory, but term window tabs work, they work right now, and they work the same way tabs work in a plethora of other applications that everyone™ has been using for a long time. :-)
@jmhorner you'll have to check if and how your terminal app is scriptable. For tmux, if it's just a matter of muscle memory, you can reconfigure the tmux key bindings.
@argv_minus_one I am actually running a pretty slim GUI with just Openbox and figured Konsole would be a ridiculous pile of dependencies but a quick check gives me the impression it really wouldn't be that bad. I am currently seeing if I can make a go of it with xdotool but may try Konsole if it fights me.
@argv_minus_one No, just a goof who thinks anything more than a solid colour background is a waste. I think the best desktop environment is the one you don't even notice.
I mean my decade old laptop is probably considered limited hardware by many people's standards, but it is plenty for me. Perhaps not a popular opinion, but it's all I got. :-)
My background is almost a solid color. It's the dot-pattern background from Macintosh System 7. It's a 2×2-pixel PNG, weighing in at a staggering 87 bytes!
Now if only I could make the Plasma panel do the rounded-corner thing that System 7 did.
Anyway, if you ever feel like running full Plasma for some reason, it'll probably work on your machine. I have it running fine on a laptop of similar age (Core 2 Duo, 4GB RAM).
Right now I have a script with a bunch of xdotool commands that works, but is a little slow. In the morning I'll see how much I can shave off the time-to-open. I'm not sure I'll stick with xdotool in the end, but it does work with my term of choice and MAY let me get rid of asbru. Not that asbru sucks, I just think it would be nice if I could replace it with "something I already have".
@jmhorner tmux/screen/byobu/etc can do this sanely with a default or selected config where windows are started with various ssh commands (and others for a common repeatable console session setup)
I guess I should add that I prefer to do this in lxterminal or xfce4-terminal, but am willing to consider another terminal that would result in less resource use and fewer child processes as Asbru. :-)
@jmhorner I did this kind of thing with screen or tmux configuration. Launch a screen session that in turn opens the ssh connections which then run the commands.
Additionally I’d have the session detach after five minutes of idle time. This allowed me to reconnect in any other terminal session without having to find the right one.
I have tried tmux and screen in the past but didn't really like them. My recollection was that when I tested them the tail'ed log files did not "record" log entries that happened while disconnected from the session but a test right now worked fine. Trouble is, with tmux (and related) I still have to [in lxterminal]:
CTRL-SHIFT-T to open a new tab
CTRL-SHIFT-I and type in the name of the new tab
ssh to box1
CTRL-SHIFT-T to open a new tab
CTRL-SHIFT-I and type in the name of the new tab
ssh to box2
CTRL-SHIFT-T to open a new tab
CTRL-SHIFT-I and type in the name of the new tab
ssh to box3
That is really the part I am having the most trouble automating.
@jmhorner@eletious@godber Yes, that gives you a tab named 'topper' with 'top' running and a tab named 'glancer' with 'glances' running (if you don't have glances installed that wont work)
@jmhorner@eletious@godber Bottom left of the terminal window should have:
[watchers]0:topper- 1:glancer*
That indicates that:
The tmux session is titled "watchers" (used to reconnect to that tmux session)
Window 0 is titled 'topper'
Window 1 is titled "glancer'
@jmhorner@LovesTha@godber ohhh, interesting. i don't know for sure, but it probably depends on your terminal emulator - i bet byobu would do exceptionally well in this case
Not so much that my current GUI based way isn't working for me, but more that it seems to be a feature that nobody wants.
From what I can find, old versions of gnome-terminal (as mentioned by @Mayabotics) actually used to have this ability, but it has since it removed. I didn't test "old version gnom-terminal" but was able to find descriptions of how people used it to accomplish what I am looking for. I'm also familiar with KiTTY, unfortunately it is a Windows-only application.
I guess it seems weird to me that it isn't a much more common request. I'll get to work shortly on trying to improve my xdotool script and see what I can come up with.
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