How to check if ssh-agent is already running in bash?
I have a sample sh
script on my Linux environment, which basically run's the ssh-agent
for the current shell, adds a key to it and runs two git commands:
#!/bin/bash
eval "$(ssh-agent -s)"
ssh-add /home/duvdevan/.ssh/id_rsa
git -C /var/www/duvdevan/ reset --hard origin/master
git -C /var/www/duvdevan/ pull origin master
Script actually works fine, but every time I run it I get a new process so I think it might become a performance issue and I might end up having useless processes out there.
An example of the output:
Agent pid 12109
Identity added: /home/duvdevan/.ssh/custom_rsa (rsa w/o comment)
Also, along with all this, is it possible to find an existing ssh-agent
process and add my keys into it?
No, really, how to check if ssh-agent
is already running in bash?
Answers so far don't appear to answer the original question...
Here's what works for me:
if ps -p $SSH_AGENT_PID > /dev/null
then
echo "ssh-agent is already running"
# Do something knowing the pid exists, i.e. the process with $PID is running
else
eval `ssh-agent -s`
fi
This was taken from here
Also, along with all this, is it possible to find an existing ssh-agent process and add my keys into it?
Yes. We can store the connection info in a file:
# Ensure agent is running
ssh-add -l &>/dev/null
if [ "$?" == 2 ]; then
# Could not open a connection to your authentication agent.
# Load stored agent connection info.
test -r ~/.ssh-agent && \
eval "$(<~/.ssh-agent)" >/dev/null
ssh-add -l &>/dev/null
if [ "$?" == 2 ]; then
# Start agent and store agent connection info.
(umask 066; ssh-agent > ~/.ssh-agent)
eval "$(<~/.ssh-agent)" >/dev/null
fi
fi
# Load identities
ssh-add -l &>/dev/null
if [ "$?" == 1 ]; then
# The agent has no identities.
# Time to add one.
ssh-add -t 4h
fi
This code is from pitfalls of ssh agents which describes both the pitfalls of what you're currently doing, of this approach, and how you should use ssh-ident to do this for you.
If you only want to run ssh-agent if it's not running and do nothing otherwise:
if [ $(ps ax | grep [s]sh-agent | wc -l) -gt 0 ] ; then
echo "ssh-agent is already running"
else
eval $(ssh-agent -s)
if [ "$(ssh-add -l)" == "The agent has no identities." ] ; then
ssh-add ~/.ssh/id_rsa
fi
# Don't leave extra agents around: kill it on exit. You may not want this part.
trap "ssh-agent -k" exit
fi
However, this doesn't ensure ssh-agent
will be accessible (just because it's running doesn't mean we have $SSH_AGENT_PID
for ssh-add
to connect to).
If you want it to be killed right after the script exits, you can just add this after the eval line:
trap "kill $SSH_AGENT_PID" exit
Or:
trap "ssh-agent -k" exit
$SSH_AGENT_PID
gets set in the eval of ssh-agent -s
.
You should be able to find running ssh-agent
s by scanning through /tmp/ssh-*
and reconstruct the SSH_AGENT
variables from it (SSH_AUTH_SOCK
and SSH_AGENT_PID
).