Set Up SSH Server on Windows XP

It is useful sometimes to set up a sshd server on a Windows. One example is using remote forwards tunnel to pass through the firewall.

My platform is Windows XP SP3.

The sshd server is sshwindows. It can be dowloaded from here: [url]http://sshwindows.sourceforge.net/[/url]. The version I use here is 3.8p1-1 20040709.

It is really easy:

1) Run sshwindows installer and click OK and OK…

2) Run cmd.exe:

3) cd C:\Program Files\OpenSSH\bin (it depends on the sshd’s install location)

4) ‘mkgroup -l >> ..\etc\group’

5) ‘mkpasswd -l >> ..\etc\passwd’

Now all local users are added to the sshd users list. More details can be found in the readme.txt file.

6) Configuration the firewall and let it allow the sshd service listening on port 22

7) Start the sshd service: ‘net start “OpenSSH Server”‘

Now it is OK ;) Try to ssh to the windows and have fun.

There are some problems such as the default home is “/home/USERNAME”, but you just get a warning and you can change to the directory by yourself. At least, it works.