A few questions regarding Expect.pm and possible alternatives

[Anonymous Monk]

Good morning Monks!

I have a few questions for you guys, so not really too sure how to title this one... I am using Expect to automate some things over here. Some of these things are simple commands, so Expect is not really necessary per se (i.e., I won't be using expect/send functionality). Others are interactive, so I will be needing Expect.

My first question is: Expect is a rather old Perl module that has not been updated in quite some time. Is this still the go-to module for automating interactive tasks via ssh, or is there something better?

Second, since I am running some commands that I only care to get the output from, and others that are interactive (i.e., where I am using expect/send), do you think it makes sense to use Net::SSH::Perl for the tasks where I need output, and Expect for those tasks that are interactive?

Finally, the commands I am running share output, have their own output, and have quite a bit of output. I could do this:

$exp->expect($timeout,
             [ qr /pattern/ => sub { do things; } ]
            );

For each and every pattern... However, say with commandA I am expecting 40 or so different possible patterns, and with commandB I am expecting 30 or so possible patterns, 20 of which I am also expecting from commandA (i.e., shared possible patterns, union). Is there an easier way to do this then? Say something like a dispatch table where output is mapped to what to do, then I could do something like:

$exp->expect($timeout, \$dispatch_table );

Or, maybe I could even have an XML file with all the possible outputs and what to dos defined? Just wondering how some of you would tackle this one, because my mind is drawing a blank.

Thank you Monks!

[5mi11er]

I would recommend you use the expect methods for most everything. Switching back and forth, wondering which method would be better means that it will become more difficult down the road to tweak things to add a smidgen more functionality if you didn't start out using expect for that task.

Expect is pretty mature, as such, there isn't a need to add features all the time, and there are apparently not many bugs that need squashed, so it's age could be considered a good thing. It works, and works well.

Update: (I didn't answer other questions)

If the expect script parts are complicated enough, you might find that writing actual expect scripts rather than embedding them in perl, and calling those scripts from perl may simplify the tasks. This is typically what I've done with my scripts. Without actual or simulated examples, it's difficult to point you in a direction or suggest improvements.

-Scott

[salva]

You can use Net::OpenSSH that integrates nicely with Expect (see 3d party module integration).