SshWithoutPasswords

Preconditions

1. You have cygwin installed on your PC.
2. You have a shell account on a UNIX server.

1 - On the Remote Host

• mkdir .ssh
• chmod 700 .ssh

2 - From Cygwin on the Local PC

• edit .profile and append

  • eval ssh-agent

• mkdir ~/.ssh
• cd .ssh
• ssh-keygen -t rsa
• name your key file "identity"
• Copy identity.pub to remote computer

3 - On the Remote Host

• append the contents of the copied identity.pub to ~/.ssh/authorized_keys

Result:

• you can `ssh remote-user-id@remote-host-name
• you can `scp local-file-name remote-user-id@remote-host-name:remote-file-name
• you can start an XTerm session with the remote host

All without entering your password.

html(<div style="color: red">) Anyone with access to your PC who can get past XP's login can now login to your UNIX account too. Keep your PC secure. You may wish to put your .ssh directory in your PGP-encrypted virtual drive. html(</div>)