Using an SSH keyfile with Fabric
Finding a simple fabfile with a working example of SSH keyfile usage isn't easy for some reason. I wrote a blog post about it (with a matching gist).
Basically, the usage goes something like this:
from fabric.api import *env.hosts = ['host.name.com']env.user = 'user'env.key_filename = '/path/to/keyfile.pem'def local_uname(): local('uname -a')def remote_uname(): run('uname -a')The important part is setting the env.key_filename environment variable, so that the Paramiko configuration can look for it when connecting.
Another cool feature available as of Fabric 1.4 - Fabric now supports SSH configs.
If you already have all the SSH connection parameters in your ~/.ssh/config file, Fabric will natively support it, all you need to do is add:
env.use_ssh_config = Trueat the beginning of your fabfile.