Christopher Juckins

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ssh_without_a_password_using_public_private_keys

SSH / rysnc without password

Make sure the same versions of ssh are on both machines.
You need to configure both client (machine connecting from) and server (machine connecting to).
On client, create ecdsa public and private keys (optionally you can also create rsa and dsa versions) with the following:

cd ~/.ssh
ssh-keygen -t ecdsa -f ~/.ssh/id_ecdsa
ssh-keygen -t rsa -f ~/.ssh/id_rsa
ssh-keygen -t dsa -f ~/.ssh/id_dsa

This creates id_ecdsa, id_ecdsa.pub, id_rsa, id_rsa.pub, id_dsa, id_dsa.pub - optionally can enter a 'passphrase' when prompted

From the client, copy the ssh public keys to the server using the following:

ssh-copy-id username@remote_host

Follow the prompts. If successful you should be able to ssh username@remote_host without a password now.

To do this process manually on the server:

cd ~/.ssh/

vi authorized_keys
Copy the id_dsa.pub and id_rsa.pub from client into authorized_keys file
Make sure permissions 600 on authorized_keys
Also:

chmod 0700 /home/<user's-home-directory>/.ssh -R

Repeat process for creating keys on server, and copy the .pub keys to the client's ~/.ssh/authorized_keys file.

Should now be able to connect without being prompted for password.

To restart sshd: kill running sshd process
now issue:

/sbin/init.d/sshd

Or for RedHat systems:

service sshd restart
ssh_without_a_password_using_public_private_keys.txt · Last modified: by juckins