Running New Processes on a Remote Computer with Output

[Stinebaugh]

I have a little tool that I use in my job for running scripts on remote machines and gathering information. Currently I'm doing this through the process class and plink/SSH which works ok. My company is looking at doing away with the SSH server on the boxes which leaves me looking for another method. I know there is psexec which might work although by default most ports are blocked by the firewall, so not positive. Is there any way I can do it programatically without the need to involve an additional application? Any method I use I need to be able to capture the output as the majority of scripts are for gathering information without logging into the server. Any help would be appreciated.

[Johan Hakkesteegt]

A simple alternative that I use for this kind of thing, is ftp. Obviously this requires an ftp server that you can upload things to from anywhere. Its pretty straightforward, but I don't think it works with sftp.

Private Sub FTP_PutFile(ByVal DestinationFileName As String, ByVal SourceFileName As String, ByVal usr As String, ByVal pwd As String)

    Dim brwsr As New System.Net.WebClient
    Dim creds As New System.Net.NetworkCredential(usr, pwd)
    Try
        With brwsr
            .Credentials = creds
            Console.WriteLine("Uploading file...")
            .UploadFile(DestinationFileName, SourceFileName)
            Console.WriteLine("Upload successful.")
            .Dispose()
        End With

    Catch ex As Exception
        EC(ex)
    End Try
End Sub

Example use:

FTP_PutFile("ftp://server.address.or.ip/file.extension", "c:\temp\file.extension", "user", "password")

Just replace the .UploadFile bit with .DownloadFile(SourceFileName, DestinationFileName) when you want to download the file from the server.

My advice is free, and you may get what you paid for.

[Stinebaugh]

I don't have any problems with getting files there as I have a network share that is accessible from all machines. I need a way to actually run the file or process on the remote machine though and capture the output of that file/process.

[Johan Hakkesteegt]

Sorry about that, I misunderstood the question. I am afraid I can't help you with this.

My advice is free, and you may get what you paid for.