[CentOS] CONNECTING VIA SSH BETWEEN CENTOS 4 AND 5

Wed Apr 16 20:59:32 UTC 2008
Chris Geldenhuis <chris.gelden at iafrica.com>

Stephen John Smoogen wrote:
> On Wed, Apr 16, 2008 at 1:32 PM, Chris Geldenhuis
> <chris.gelden at iafrica.com> wrote:
>   
>> Hi,
>>
>>  I am trying to set up an automatic connection between CentOS 4 system
>> (server) and a CentOS 5 DomU VM (client) via ssh to enable my to back up
>> development files on the server to the client with a cron process.
>>
>>  I generate they key pair without a pass phrase on the client and copy the
>> public key to the same user's .ssh directory on the server as
>> authorized_keys2.
>>
>>  When I try to ssh to the Server from the Client, I am still asked for the
>> user's password on the client.
>>
>>  If I do the same with CentOS 5 for both Client and Server, I can login
>> without providing a password.
>>
>>  The versions of ssh on the two systems are:
>>
>>  Client (CentOS 5):   OpenSSH_4.3p2, OpenSSL 0.9.8b 04 May 2006
>>
>>  Server (CentOS 4):   OpenSSH_3.9p1, OpenSSL 0.9.7a Feb 19 2003
>>
>>  Does anyone on the list know whether these versions are compatible or how
>> to get them to work together without requiring a password.
>>
>>  It is not an option to change to CentOS5 on the server side as that system
>> is serving as a development system for a client running RedHat ES 4 and has
>> to have the identical configuration and be binary compatible.
>>     
>
> I know this works between the entire CentOS family. The main problems
> I have seen are that the users home directory or .ssh permissions are
> not secure enough for ssh to do its thing.
>
> ssh -v -v -v will tell you more than you want on where it is having
> problems.. but the quick fix I use are the following:
>
> su - root
> chown $user $user_homedir # fill in $user and $user_home correctly as
> in dude and /nfs/home/d/dude
> chmod 0750 $user_homedir
> chown $user $user_homedir/.ssh
> chmod 0700 $user_homedir/.ssh
> chmod 0600 $user_homedir/.ssh/authorized_keys
>
> If that doesn't fix the problem the -v -v -v will tel what else might
> be the cause.
>
>
>
>   
Thanks - changing the permissions fixed the problem . Thanks also to 
Daniel for his suggestions.

ChrisG