Using Fabric to get quick overview of linux system¶

One can use python module Fabric to get some quick information about your linux system. First, look at https://docs.fabfile.org/en/stable/index.html and install it:

$ pip install -U fabric

Now launch python and test if it works on the simplest case:

>> from fabric import Connection;
>> result = Connection('yourusername@someserver.org').run('uname -a', hide=True);
>> print(result);

In case ssh-key is protected with password, use:

$ eval $(ssh-agent); ssh-add

Further, you may create a python script to check the state of several servers at once:

import getpass
from fabric import Connection;
hosts = ["server1.org", "server2.org", "server3.org", "server4.org"]
commands = ["uname -a", "last -n 10", "free -m", "df -h", "netstat -tuan"]
connection_args = dict(port=22, user=getpass.getuser())
run_args = dict(hide=False)
for h in hosts:
print("Server:", h);
conn = Connection(host=h, **connection_args)
for cmd in commands:
   print("Command:", cmd);
   res = conn.run(cmd, **run_args)
   print()
print()

Save this script to servermonitor.py and run:

$ python servermonitor.py

It is supposed that you have the same username in your local machine and in remote servers. You can modify the commands-line according to your needs.