The Awesome Program You Never Should Use
I've been hesitating for a couple months about whether to mention sshpass. Conceptually, it's a horrible, horrible program. It basically allows you to enter an SSH user name and password on the command line, so you can create a connection without any interaction. A far better way to accomplish that is with public/private keypairs. But it's still something I find useful from time to time, and I'd rather mention it with all the warnings in the world than to pretend it doesn't exist.
So, sshpass—it's a simple tool, but in a pinch, it can be incredibly
helpful. You use it with the user name and password as command-line
arguments (with some variations, see the help screen in the screenshot),
and it injects them into your ssh
(or
scp
) command.
Again, this is a horribly insecure method for entering passwords. However, I find
it particularly useful for setting up new machines, especially
computers or devices in a closed environment. I've also used it to
send files via scp
to hundreds of machines in my local network that
I'll never need to connect to again. It's a dangerous tool, but can be
a lifesaver if you need it. Search your distribution's repositories,
as it's available for most systems. And remember, don't ever use it!