Fabric is a Python (2.5-2.7) library and command-line tool for streamlining the use of SSH for application deployment or systems administration tasks.
It provides a basic suite of operations for executing local or remote shell
commands (normally or via sudo) and uploading/downloading files, as well as
auxiliary functionality such as prompting the running user for input, or
aborting execution.
Typical use involves creating a Python module containing one or more functions,
then executing them via the fab command-line tool. Below is a small but
complete "fabfile" containing a single task:
from fabric.api import run
def host_type():
run('uname -s')
Once a task is defined, it may be run on one or more servers, like so:
$ fab -H localhost,linuxbox host_type [localhost] run: uname -s [localhost] out: Darwin [linuxbox] run: uname -s [linuxbox] out: Linux Done. Disconnecting from localhost... done. Disconnecting from linuxbox... done.
In addition to use via the fab tool, Fabric's components may be imported
into other Python code, providing a Pythonic interface to the SSH protocol
suite at a higher level than that provided by e.g. the Paramiko library
(which Fabric itself uses.)