How to input automatically when running a shell over SSH? - shell

Question

In my shell script I am running a command which is asking me for input.
How can I give the command the input it needs automatically?
For example:
$cat test.sh
ssh-copy-id tester#10.1.2.3
When running test.sh:
First, it will ask:
Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no)?
Then, it will ask me to input the password:
tester#10.1.2.3's password:
Is there a way to input this automatically?

Answer 1

For simple input, like two prompts and two corresponding fixed responses, you could also use a "here document", the syntax of which looks like this:
test.sh <<!
y
pasword
!
The << prefixes a pattern, in this case '!'. Everything up to a line beginning with that pattern is interpreted as standard input. This approach is similar to the suggestion to pipe a multi-line echo into ssh, except that it saves the fork/exec of the echo command and I find it a bit more readable. The other advantage is that it uses built-in shell functionality so it doesn't depend on expect.

Answer 2

For general command-line automation, Expect is the classic tool. Or try pexpect if you're more comfortable with Python.
Here's a similar question that suggests using Expect: Use expect in bash script to provide password to SSH command

Answer 3

There definitely is... Use the spawn, expect, and send commands:
spawn test.sh
expect "Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no)?"
send "yes"
There are more examples all over Stack Overflow, see:
Help with Expect within a bash script
You may need to install these commands first, depending on your system.

Answer 4

Also you can pipe the answers to the script:
printf "y\npassword\n" | sh test.sh
where \n is escape-sequence

Answer 5

ssh-key with passphrase, with keychain
keychain is a small utility which manages ssh-agent on your behalf and allows the ssh-agent to remain running when the login session ends. On subsequent logins, keychain will connect to the existing ssh-agent instance. In practice, this means that the passphrase must be be entered only during the first login after a reboot. On subsequent logins, the unencrypted key from the existing ssh-agent instance is used. This can also be useful for allowing passwordless RSA/DSA authentication in cron jobs without passwordless ssh-keys.
To enable keychain, install it and add something like the following to ~/.bash_profile:
eval keychain --agents ssh --eval id_rsa
From a security point of view, ssh-ident and keychain are worse than ssh-agent instances limited to the lifetime of a particular session, but they offer a high level of convenience. To improve the security of keychain, some people add the --clear option to their ~/.bash_profile keychain invocation. By doing this passphrases must be re-entered on login as above, but cron jobs will still have access to the unencrypted keys after the user logs out. The keychain wiki page has more information and examples.
Got this info from;
https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/90853/how-can-i-run-ssh-add-automatically-without-password-prompt
Hope this helps
I have personally been able to automatically enter my passphrase upon terminal launch by doing this: (you can, of course, modify the script and fit it to your needs)
edit the bashrc file to add this script;
Check if the SSH agent is awake
if [ -z "$SSH_AUTH_SOCK" ] ; then
exec ssh-agent bash -c "ssh-add ; $0"
echo "The SSH agent was awakened"
exit
fi
Above line will start the expect script upon terminal launch.
./ssh.exp
here's the content of this expect script
#!/usr/bin/expect
set timeout 20
set passphrase "test"
spawn "./keyadding.sh"
expect "Enter passphrase for /the/path/of/yourkey_id_rsa:"
send "$passphrase\r";
interact
Here's the content of my keyadding.sh script (you must put both scripts in your home folder, usually /home/user)
#!/bin/bash
ssh-add /the/path/of/yourkey_id_rsa
exit 0
I would HIGHLY suggest encrypting the password on the .exp script as well as renaming this .exp file to something like term_boot.exp or whatever else for security purposes. Don't forget to create the files directly from the terminal using nano or vim (ex: nano ~/.bashrc | nano term_boot.exp) and also a chmod +x script.sh to make it executable. A chmod +r term_boot.exp would be also useful but you'll have to add sudo before ./ssh.exp in your bashrc file. So you'll have to enter your sudo password each time you launch your terminal. For me, it's more convenient than the passphrase cause I remember my admin (sudo) password by the hearth.
Also, here's another way to do it I think;
https://www.cyberciti.biz/faq/noninteractive-shell-script-ssh-password-provider/
Will certainly change my method for this one when I'll have the time.

Answer 6

You can write the expect script as follow:
$ vi login.exp
#!/usr/bin/expect -f
spawn ssh username#machine.IP
expect "*assword: "
send -- "PASSWORD\r"
interact
And run it as:
$ expect login.exp