http://kevin.vanzonneveld.net/techblog/article/make_ssh_connections_with_php/

But then there are problems:

http://blog.weaverling.org/2009/05/26/automating-wordpress-uploads-using-ssh/

Tried some of the stuff in here:  http://codeghar.wordpress.com/2010/04/25/secure-your-ssh/

• Go to the place where the domain is registered (eg: hostmonster) and have it point to the ns1.slicehost.com, ns2.slicehost.com and ns3.slicehost.com
• Create an apache virtual host file in /etc/apache2/sites-available/example1.com. Example:

# Place any notes or comments you have here
# It will make any customization easier to understand in the weeks to come

# domain: nycsubwayexplorer
# public: /home/nick/www.nycsubwayexplorer.com/public_html

  # Admin email, Server Name (domain name) and any aliases
  ServerAdmin nick@porcaro.org
  ServerName  www.nycsubwayexplorer.com
  ServerAlias nycsubwayexplorer.com
  ServerAlias nycsubwayexplorer.org
  ServerAlias nycsubwayexplorer.net

  # Index file and Document Root (where the public files are located)
  DirectoryIndex index.php
  DocumentRoot /home/nick/www.nycsubwayexplorer.com/public_html

       Options -Indexes
       AllowOverride All
       Order allow,deny
       allow from all
       AddHandler mod_python .py
       PythonHandler mod_python.publisher
       PythonDebug On

  # Custom log file locations
  LogLevel warn
  ErrorLog  /home/nick/log/www.nycsubwayexplorer.com/error.log
  CustomLog /home/nick/log/www.nycsubwayexplorer.com/access.log combined

• Create a link in sites-enable:

nick(nickporcaro): pwd
/etc/apache2
nick(nickporcaro): ls -l sites-enabled/*
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 40 Nov  6 04:57 sites-enabled/nycsubwayexplorer.com -> ../sites-available/nycsubwayexplorer.com

• Go to the DNS tab of the slice manager – pick duplicate on an entry on the right and then rename it to either the original (nycsubwayexplorer.com in the example above) or an alias (nycsubwayexplorer.net in the example above)