UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

Not sure if it's relevant but the computer I'm telnetting to is running VxWorks.

I was told to use telnet and ssh only. If I cannot use a here doc, is there another way to telnet without piping? I tried the code below which doesn't work.

Code:

echo username > $TMPFILE
echo password >> $TMPFILE
echo command >> $TMPFILE
echo logout >> $TMPFILE
 
telnet server < $TMPFILE

What Operating System and version are you using and what Shell do you use?

Some posters would suggest using the unix "expect" command, but not every unix has that command. Personally I have had no reliable success with automating "telnet" because is is intended to be resilient to scripted "trial-and-error" login attacts. I just use Remote Shell if I want to run a command on another computer (it's the insecure version of "ssh").

I'm on AIX 5.3 using Korn shell.

So one (dumb) fix I tried was to redirect standard output to a file then grep that file for what I need. If I can't figure out a better way to do it, this is what I'll check in. At least it works!

Not dumb, sensible approach. I'd also redirect STDERR to another file.
There is only so much you can do in a pipeline. Sometimes your script will need to read the log file more than once. Also you get an audit/diagnostic trail which is so much easier to debug.

Code:

mycommand 1>mystdout.log 2>mystderr.log

For some reason this works a lot better for comms commands (incl. telnet, remsh, nslookup, ping etc.) than:

Code:

mycommand 2>&1 >mycombinedlog.log

Where is CFAJohnson when you need him?