Checking a file on a remote windows server

UNIX Solaris
1

Hi Everyone!

This is what I need to do...
I am deploying some directories over to a windows server 2000/3 box from my solaris10 box and I need to make sure the directories exist.

The only form of connection I have to work with is SSH
Currently, my script deploys the directories over to the windows box using SCP. After each scp command I want to verify the existing directories on the windows box

I am still new to this and I am having a hard time wrapping my head around this...

when I ssh into the windows box I only have windows commands to work with

Is there another way to do this?

the only way I could think of was to

1) scp the directories
2) scp a batch file which checks for the existance of the directory and output exist or notexist to a txt
3) send the output back to my solaris10 box
4) then use some commands on the solaris box to determine if the txt exist (exit=0) or notexist(exit=1)

I was hoping one of you could enlighten me and throw out some thoughts on how to go about this..

thank you so much

Erin

2

Not familiar with behaviour of sshd on Windows but one can run a command on a remote host thus:
$ ssh host command

So you might be able to run "dir" on your Windows machine from your Solaris box like this:
$ ssh windowsmachine dir > resultfile 2>&1

and then grep the resultfile for the directory you are looking for and if you are lucky then you may get the string <DIR> (DOS style dir result) on each line that is a directory also!

3

Thanks for the reply

I just tried:

ssh user@windowsbox dir

but it gives me dir not found

I can ssh user@windowsbox then use the command dir but not using that syntax..

any other ideas?
there must be a way to do this

I can't ssh directly into a specific directory of a host right?

like ssh machinename:/export/home

that doesn't seem to work

Any help would greatly appreciated... I'm going to browse the net some more and play around with this...

Thanks!

4

just an update, seems as though

ssh user@windowsbox command works when I use unix commands (which is awesome!) :slight_smile:

5

When you ssh in you will normally be placed into the user's home directory.

Interesting about the Unix commands, you may be able to do:
$ ssh user@windowsbox "cd /export/home && ls -l"

or at least:

$ ssh user@windowsbox "ls -l /export/home"

6

I'm trying to use the test e command on a file on the windows box

I want to (if possible) to capture the exit status

when I do

ssh user@windowsbox test -e filelocation

then run

echo $? I still get exit status 0 even if the file is not there...

Any ideas?

7

The $? at the Solaris box end is capturing the successful run of the ssh command.

You could try:
$ ssh user@windowsbox "test -f filelocation; echo $?" > resultfile
and then look in resultfile and for a 0 or non-zero character?

or you could try:
$ ssh user@windowsbox "ls filelocation" > resultfile 2>&1

and the check the contents of resultfile for the "No such file or directory" message, e.g.

if [ -z "`grep "No such file or directory" resultfile`" ]; then
echo "File exists."
else
echo "File does not exist."
fi

8

Thanks for all the help Tony

when I do the ssh user@box command >> resultfile from unix to unix I get the file

but when I do that same command from unix to windows the file is not created on the windows machine or my local (solaris box)

9

the command that doesn't give me an output file (just to be more clear)

ssh user@windowsbox test -e filenamelocation >> resultsfile

that resultsfile doesn't show up on my unix box where I'm performing the command or the windows box

is there a way to specify where the output can go? (like explicitly setting the unix host for the results file?)

10

It should be on the Unix box, could try /tmp/resultfile so you know for definite where it is, note >> will append more lines to resultfile hence better to use > in this situation so you only have the result of the last test run in resultfile.

11

hrmmm

I don't see any results file... when I do this very command from unix to unix everything works but somewhere between the unix to windows box my output is going missing..

and I forgot to add the last bit to the command (might be able to give someone some insight)

ssh user@windowsbox test -e filenamelocation || echo $? > /tmp/results

12

Thanks Tony

I'm going to play around with this and see if I can get that output

if anyone knows what I'm doing wrong with that command, I would really appreciate the advice

Thanks
Erin

13

UPDATE:

the following command works for unix to unix (tested on Solaris10)

(this is a simple way to verify files)

ssh user@hostname test -e file_to_check ; echo $? /tmp/exitstatus

that will give you a 1 or 0 in relation to the file being there or not

Anyways, that does not work with my unix > windows ordeal... I always get 0 exit status

I've tried Tony's other solution regarding ls and using grep for the exit status and that is working for me

If there are any other possible ways I would love to hear it :slight_smile:

14

Kepepcase:
The speech marks around the command "test -e file_to_check ; echo $?" as in:

# ssh user@hostname "test -e file_to_check ; echo $?" > /tmp/exitstatus

ensures that the commands in the speech marks are run on the remote machine, the:
> /tmp/exitstatus
will therefore do its stuff on your local machine and should create the file on the local machine.