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Editorial Team
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Asked: 2026-06-12T16:23:20+00:00

Success: >>> scp_cmd = rsudo scp -i /home/backup/.ssh/id_rsa /opt/backups/*conf backup@a-hostname.local:/opt/backups/ >>> subprocess.call(scp_cmd, shell=True) 1eadmin1.conf

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Success:

>>> scp_cmd = r"sudo scp -i /home/backup/.ssh/id_rsa /opt/backups/*conf backup@a-hostname.local:/opt/backups/"
>>> subprocess.call(scp_cmd, shell=True)
1eadmin1.conf                                                  100%   83KB  83.5KB/s   00:00
1stflr_1.conf                                                  100% 2904     2.8KB/s   00:00
>>> scp_cmd = """sudo scp -i /home/backup/.ssh/id_rsa /opt/backups/*conf backup@a-hostname.local:/opt/backups/"""
>>> os.system(scp_cmd)
1eadmin1.conf                                                  100%   83KB  87.3KB/s   00:00
1stflr_1.conf                                                  100% 2904     3.4KB/s   00:00

Failure:

>>> scp_cmd = r"""sudo scp -i /home/backup/.ssh/id_rsa /opt/backups/*conf backup@a-hostname.local:/opt/backups/"""
>>> subprocess.call(scp_cmd, shell=True)
/opt/backups/*conf: No such file or directory
1
>>> subprocess.call(scp_cmd.split(' '))
/opt/backups/\*conf: No such file or directory
1
>>>
>>> subprocess.call(shlex.split(scp_cmd))
/opt/backups/*conf: No such file or directory
1

I’m confused why the triple quotes fail when I use subprocess.call(), but pass when I use os.system(). Why is there a difference between subprocess.call() and os.system() when handling triple quoted strings?

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    I am pretty certain you are doing something else different; the triple quoting isn’t making a difference here at all:

    >>> a = r"sudo scp -i /home/backup/.ssh/id_rsa /opt/backups/*conf backup@a-hostname.local:/opt/backups/"
>>> b = r"""sudo scp -i /home/backup/.ssh/id_rsa /opt/backups/*conf backup@a-hostname.local:/opt/backups/"""
>>> a == b
True
>>> b
'sudo scp -i /home/backup/.ssh/id_rsa /opt/backups/*conf backup@a-hostname.local:/opt/backups/'
>>> a
'sudo scp -i /home/backup/.ssh/id_rsa /opt/backups/*conf backup@a-hostname.local:/opt/backups/'

    Using triple quoting is just one way to specify a python string literal. How you specified that literal (with or without the r raw prefix, with single or triple quotes, using single ' or double " quotes) is not preserved.

    Where triple quoting does make a difference is when you include a newline:

    >>> foo = '''
... '''
>>> foo
'\n'

    But your examples do not include any newlines at all.

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