purple-ssh 1.12.0

Install

curl -fsSL getpurple.sh | sh

Homebrew (macOS)

brew install erickochen/purple/purple

Cargo (crate name: purple-ssh)

cargo install purple-ssh

From source

git clone https://github.com/erickochen/purple.git
cd purple && cargo build --release

Update

purple update

Downloads the latest release from GitHub, verifies the checksum and replaces the binary in place. macOS only (installed via curl). Homebrew users should run brew upgrade erickochen/purple/purple instead. Cargo users should run cargo install purple-ssh. The TUI also checks for updates on startup and shows a notification in the title bar when a new version is available.

Launch, search and connect

🚀 Instant search. Filter on alias, hostname, user, tags or provider as you type

🏷️ Tags. Label hosts with #tags, filter with the tag picker or tag: search

📊 Connection history. Frecency sorting surfaces your most-used and most-recent hosts

📡 Ping. TCP connectivity check per host or all at once

📥 Bulk import. From a hosts file or ~/.ssh/known_hosts

🔑 SSH key management. Browse keys with metadata and linked hosts

🔀 Tunnels. Add, edit and manage LocalForward, RemoteForward and DynamicForward per host. Start and stop background tunnels from the TUI.

📋 Clipboard. Copy the SSH command or full config block

Cloud provider sync

Pull your servers from DigitalOcean, Vultr, Linode, Hetzner, UpCloud and Proxmox VE directly into ~/.ssh/config. Sync adds new hosts, updates changed IPs and merges tags. Tags you add manually are preserved across syncs. Use --reset-tags to replace local tags with provider tags. Preview with --dry-run.

purple provider add digitalocean --token YOUR_TOKEN   # or use PURPLE_TOKEN env var
purple provider add digitalocean --token-stdin         # pipe from password manager
purple sync

Synced hosts are tagged by provider and appear alongside your manual hosts. The provider list is sorted by last sync time (most recent first) and shows sync results per provider (server count and time ago or error details).

Your config, respected

🔄 Round-trip fidelity. Comments, indentation and unknown directives are preserved through every read-write cycle. Consecutive blank lines are collapsed to keep your config clean.

📂 Include support. Hosts from Include files are displayed but never modified

🔒 Atomic writes. Temp file, chmod 600, rename. No half-written configs.

💾 Automatic backups. Every write to an existing config creates a timestamped backup. Keeps the last 5.

♻️ Auto-reload. Detects external config changes and reloads automatically

🎨 Monochrome UI. Works in any terminal, any font. One splash of color (the purple badge). Respects NO_COLOR.

🐚 Shell completions. Bash, zsh and fish.

Get started

purple

That's it. purple reads your ~/.ssh/config and shows your hosts. Navigate with j/k, search with /, connect with Enter. Press ? for the full cheat sheet.

Usage

purple                              # Launch the TUI
purple myserver                     # Connect or search
purple -c myserver                  # Direct connect
purple --list                       # List all hosts
purple add deploy@10.0.1.5:22      # Quick-add a host
purple import hosts.txt             # Bulk import from file
purple import --known-hosts         # Import from known_hosts
purple provider add digitalocean    # Configure cloud provider
purple sync                         # Sync all providers
purple sync --dry-run               # Preview sync changes
purple sync --remove                # Remove hosts deleted from provider
purple sync --reset-tags            # Replace local tags with provider tags
purple tunnel list                  # List configured tunnels
purple tunnel add myserver L:8080:localhost:80  # Add forward
purple tunnel start myserver        # Start tunnel (Ctrl+C to stop)
purple update                       # Update to latest version
purple --completions zsh            # Shell completions

Host List

Tunnel List

Provider List

Search

Form

What makes purple different?

It edits your real SSH config. Most SSH config tools only read. purple reads, edits and writes ~/.ssh/config directly.

It doesn't break anything. Comments, indentation, unknown directives. All preserved through every edit. Tested with 1063 tests including round-trip integration.

It syncs your cloud servers. purple is the only SSH config manager we know of that pulls hosts from DigitalOcean, Vultr, Linode, Hetzner, UpCloud and Proxmox VE directly into your config. Configure once, sync anytime.

It imports what you already have. Bulk import from host files or ~/.ssh/known_hosts. No manual re-entry.

It's a single Rust binary. No runtime, no daemon, no async framework. Install and run.

FAQ

Does purple modify my existing SSH config? Only when you add, edit, delete or sync. Auto-sync runs on startup for providers that have it enabled (toggle per provider, on by default). All writes are atomic with automatic backups.

Will purple break my comments or formatting? No. purple preserves comments, indentation and unknown directives through every read-write cycle. Consecutive blank lines are collapsed to one.

Does purple need a daemon or background process? No. It's a single binary. Run it, use it, close it.

Does purple send my SSH config anywhere? No. Your config never leaves your machine. Provider sync calls cloud APIs to fetch server lists. The TUI checks GitHub for new releases on startup (cached for 24 hours). No config data is transmitted in either case.

Why is the crate called purple-ssh? The name purple was taken on crates.io. The binary is still called purple.

Built with

Rust. 1063 tests. Zero clippy warnings. No async runtime. Single binary.