[Info-vax] OpenVMS SSH to freeSSHd on Windows

[Steven Schweda]

On Nov 11, 9:12 pm, Sum1 <n... at here.com> wrote:

> [...] I cannot get VMS to
> authenticate with public keys.

   "I cannot" is not a useful problem description.  It does
not say what you did.  It does not say what happened when you
did it.

> [...] OVMS 8.3, TCP/IP 5.6 with all the SSH
> compenentry sitting at 5.6-9

   Actual output from, say:
      tcpip show version
      ssh "-V"
might be more helpful/informative/reliable.

> I have tried generating keys using:
> [...]

   Where?  The TCPIP SSH software can't use OpenSSH-format
key data.  After:
      @ SYS$MANAGER:TCPIP$DEFINE_COMMANDS.COM
you can generate some SSH2 key files using SSH_KEYGEN.  Then,
you can compare those to what you've been trying to use, and
see how different they are.

> [...]  One by one, I have copied them to the server and
> tried to use them - nothing!

   And "nothing" is what that tells me about what you did, or
what happened when you did it.

> [...]   Extensive Googling [...]

   Did Google tell you about the value of adding "-v" (or
"-vv", ...) to a failing "ssh" command?  Some actual
diagnostic output might be more helpful than "nothing" in
diagnosing this problem.

   All that Web searching should have told you that common
SSH problems (other than key data format differences) include
various file ownership and permission/protection settings.
(No information about which did I see in your problem
description.)

> [...] the suggestions
> to vonvert the keys on the server-side won't work, as
> freeSSHd doesn't provide anything other than a server - no
> ssh commands.

   Which suggestions, exactly, were those?  You shouldn't
need any "ssh commands".  An OpenSSH ssh-keygen program
should have a "-e" option which would tell it to convert an
OpenSSH key file to the SSH2 (aka "SECSH") format.  (And/or a
"-i" option to go the other way.)

> Connecting to the freeSSHd server using certificates
> generated by True64 works fine.  I wonder if I could just
> copy them onto the VMS machine and use them?

   With my weak psychic powers, I don't know exactly how you
did what on your Tru64 system.  On _my_ Tru64 system, the SSH
software seems to use the same SSH2 format as my VMS+TCPIP
uses, so I'd expect no conversion to be necessary when moving
key data between those systems.

   I'm sorry if you're frustrated, but neither my sorrow nor
your frustration is so valuable as an accurate and detailed
problem description.

   I've never heard of freeSSHd, so I know nothing about it.
Perhaps other VMS users would be in the same situation.  If I
need to know anything about it, then you might consider
providing a pointer to some documentation, as I may be too
lazy to look very hard to find it.