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SSH login banner (MOTD)

A short login-shell hook that prints a hostname banner plus optional system info when you SSH into a managed host. Local terminals stay silent — the banner exists purely for fleet identification: when you ssh to one of ten boxes managed by just fleet-apply, the banner answers "which box am I on?" instantly.

Source: dot_zlogin.tmpl → ~/.zlogin.

Three styles, picked at chezmoi init

The chezmoi prompt motdStyle chooses which style this host uses. Default is figlet; switch via the prompt at init time, or override at runtime per machine via MOTD_STYLE in ~/.zshrc.adhoc.

Style Lines Latency Contains Fits in
figlet (default) ~6 ~5 ms figlet hostname + 1-line metadata (profile/OS/uptime/IP) 24-row mobile SSH ✅
fastfetch-slim ~10–13 ~80 ms figlet hostname + fastfetch w/o logo (Title/OS/Kernel/Uptime/CPU/Memory/Disk) half-screen tmux split ✅
fastfetch-full ~22+ ~150 ms full distro logo + every field fastfetch knows (GPU, packages, theme, displays, …) full-screen desktop terminal

figlet style (default)

   _   _      _    ___  _
  | | | |__ _| |__|__ \| |__
  | |_| / _` | '_ \ / // '_ \
   \___/\__,_|_.__//_(_)_.__/

profile=ubuntu_server  os=Linux 6.5.0-21-generic  up=4 days  via=192.168.1.42

Cyan figlet + dim metadata row. Uses font figlet -f small.

fastfetch-slim style

   _   _      _    ___  _
  | | | |__ _| |__|__ \| |__
  | |_| / _` | '_ \ / // '_ \
   \___/\__,_|_.__//_(_)_.__/

user@hub3
OS: Ubuntu 24.04.1 LTS x86_64
Kernel: Linux 6.8.0-45-generic
Uptime: 12 days, 3 hours
CPU: Intel i7-12700H (20)
Memory: 8.42 GiB / 32.00 GiB (26%)
Disk (/): 41 GiB / 200 GiB (20%)

Skips logo (figlet already gave you the big hostname) and skips slow probes (Packages, GPU, displays). Structure: Title:OS:Kernel:Uptime:CPU:Memory:Disk.

fastfetch-full style

            .-/+oossssoo+/-.               user@desktop
        `:+ssssssssssssssssss+:`           ----------
      -+ssssssssssssssssssyyssss+-         OS: Ubuntu 24.04.1 LTS x86_64
   .ossssssssssssssssssdMMMNysssso.        Host: ThinkPad P14s Gen 4
  /ssssssssssshdmmNNmmyNMMMMhssssss/       Kernel: Linux 6.8.0-45
 +ssssssssshmydMMMMMMMNddddyssssssss+      Uptime: 12 days, 3 hours
... (full distro logo + ~20 info rows incl. GPU, displays, theme, packages) ...

The classic neofetch-style screenshot. Use it on machines you genuinely want to show off.

Trigger conditions

The banner fires only when all four gates pass — independent of style:

# Gate Why
1 [ -n "$SSH_CONNECTION" ] Empty on console / local / tmux new
2 [ -t 1 ] stdout must be a TTY → suppresses ssh host 'cmd', scp, rsync, fleet-apply SSH probes
3 [ -z "$TMUX" ] Print once per SSH session, not per tmux pane
4 [ "${MOTD_DISABLE:-0}" != "1" ] Per-session opt-out

zsh sources .zlogin only for login shells, so new tmux panes (default config) and non-interactive zsh -c invocations don't even reach the script. Gates 2 and 3 are belt-and-suspenders against tmux configs that force login shells inside panes.

Tools used

figlet is always used (every style starts with the figlet hostname, except fastfetch-full which uses fastfetch's own logo).

fastfetch is the modern Rust replacement for the now-deprecated neofetch — used by the fastfetch-slim and fastfetch-full styles. If fastfetch isn't installed (e.g., first-boot SSH before ansible runs, or a noRoot Ubuntu 22.04 host where the GitHub .deb fallback failed), the slim/full styles fall back to the figlet style automatically — never errors out.

Companion tools toilet (color/Unicode figlet superset) and lolcat (rainbow color filter) are installed by devtools but not used by the MOTD itself — they're general-purpose user CLIs you can pipe to:

echo "deploy ok" | toilet -f mono12 --metal
echo "RAINBOW" | figlet | lolcat

The MOTD uses only ANSI escapes (cyan + dim) so it stays deterministic over flaky SSH and never depends on an external color filter being present.

Switching styles

Three paths, in increasing order of "how persistent / how heavy":

1. Per-session (no persistence)

Just prefix the SSH command:

MOTD_STYLE=fastfetch-full ssh host       # one shot
MOTD_DISABLE=1 ssh host                  # silent for this connection

Nothing on disk changes. Useful for "let me see the full info just this once".

2. Persistent runtime override (no chezmoi apply needed)

Add to ~/.zshrc.adhoc (auto-created by dot_zshrc.tmpl, not chezmoi-managed):

export MOTD_STYLE=fastfetch-slim   # one of: figlet | fastfetch-slim | fastfetch-full

MOTD_STYLE env var beats {{ .motdStyle }} baked into ~/.zlogin. No re-render, no re-init — survives reboots and SSH reconnects. The intended path for "this one box wants a different style than the fleet default".

3. Edit the chezmoi source (fleet-wide / canonical default)

This is the path that changes the actual baked value in ~/.zlogin. Two equivalent ways to update the source:

chezmoi init --force                            # re-run all prompts (heavier; you'll re-answer everything)
# OR
$EDITOR ~/.config/chezmoi/chezmoi.toml          # edit just the motdStyle line directly

⚠️ Gotcha: editing ~/.config/chezmoi/chezmoi.toml alone does nothing. The file is just the source data — ~/.zlogin is a generated artifact that's only refreshed during chezmoi apply. So you must follow up with:

chezmoi apply ~/.zlogin

Verify it took:

grep '_motd_style=' ~/.zlogin
# Expected: _motd_style="${MOTD_STYLE:-fastfetch-slim}"

The chezmoi mental model: chezmoi.toml (source) → dot_zlogin.tmpl (template) → ~/.zlogin (target, regenerated only by apply). Path 2 above sidesteps this entirely by reading the env var at runtime, which is why it doesn't need an apply.

Opt out completely

export MOTD_DISABLE=1   # in ~/.zshrc.adhoc

Or per session: MOTD_DISABLE=1 ssh host.

First boot (before fastfetch is installed)

Chezmoi deploys ~/.zlogin before the ansible devtools role runs. If you SSH in during that window with motdStyle=fastfetch-slim:

  • command -v fastfetch returns false
  • Falls back to figlet style (figlet hostname + metadata line)
  • Still exits cleanly

After ansible finishes, the next SSH login uses fastfetch.

Customization

Change the figlet font

Edit ~/.zlogin directly (or, for fleet rollout, dot_zlogin.tmpl):

# Inside _motd_print_figlet_banner():
figlet -w "$_motd_cols" -f banner -- "$_motd_host"   # blocky
figlet -w "$_motd_cols" -f slant  -- "$_motd_host"   # italic
figlet -w "$_motd_cols" -f standard -- "$_motd_host" # tall default

Fonts live under /usr/share/figlet/ (Linux) or $(brew --prefix figlet)/share/figlet/fonts/ (macOS). The small default fits ~20-char hostnames inside a 24-row mobile SSH window.

Change fastfetch-slim fields

Inside dot_zlogin.tmpl, the slim case calls:

fastfetch --logo none -s Title:OS:Kernel:Uptime:CPU:Memory:Disk

-s/--structure takes any colon-separated list of fastfetch --list-modules modules. Common additions: LocalIP, PublicIP (slow), LoadAvg, Battery, Locale, Shell, Packages. Each adds ~5-30 ms.

Customize fastfetch-full config

fastfetch --gen-config-force writes ~/.config/fastfetch/config.jsonc with the default config — edit it to add/remove modules, swap logos, change colors. Chezmoi doesn't manage that file, so tweaks survive chezmoi apply. See https://github.com/fastfetch-cli/fastfetch/wiki/Configuration for the schema.

Show FQDN instead of short hostname

_motd_host="$(hostname -f 2>/dev/null || hostname)"

Skip the metadata line on figlet style

Delete _motd_print_metadata_line from the figlet|*) case in dot_zlogin.tmpl.

Why not /etc/motd or PAM motd.dynamic?

System MOTD lives in /etc/motd and /etc/update-motd.d/* and applies to every user. This banner is per-user, lives in the dotfiles repo, and respects user opt-out — no root needed, no impact on other accounts. Ubuntu's default MOTD (the load-average / "X updates can be installed" / Canonical news lines) stacks above our banner in the SSH boot order:

SSH connect → PAM auth → pam_motd prints /etc/motd + update-motd.d/*
                                           ↓
                          shell starts → zsh → .zshenv → .zshrc → .zlogin (us)
                                                                       ↓
                                                                   prompt

To silence Ubuntu's stuff:

touch ~/.hushlogin   # per-user; silences pam_motd for you only
sudo chmod -x /etc/update-motd.d/50-motd-news   # system-wide; kills Canonical news