Web-based *nix shell

Question

is there any solution like LogmeIn consisting on a small client to install upon a *nix machine and hence being able to use its shell from the browser bypassing proxies because it all will work on :80? Thanks

Answer 1

My favourite solution to this is Ajaxterm which I run on an https server since port 443 is rarely blocked and the encrypted stream can't be decoded by firewalls.

http://antony.lesuisse.org/software/ajaxterm/

Answer 2

The client doesn't have to run in a browser to use port 80 or 443. Just add a line with Port 80 in /etc/ssh/sshd_config and restart sshd. This obviously requires root or sudo privileges. Then you can connect to the computer using any SSH client, while specifying port 80 (e.g. ssh -p 80 user@host.org).

This solution makes sshd listen on port 80. It will not work if the server runs a web server, of course.

If you rather want port 443, change the port number, or add another line with Port 443.

Answer 3

Try this solution "MindTerm". I used an early release years ago and it worked pretty well. I configured Apache to use http based authorization when accessing a special url, e.g. "/myshell/" for further protection.

Answer 4

If your system can connect to the outside using SSH, and you have some other system that's always online, you can create a reverse SSH tunnel.

I highly recommend using autossh for this purpose (after setting up public key authentication), eg.

autossh -M 12345 -f -R 2200:localhost:22 user@target.example.com

will set up a tunnel where connecting to the remote system's port 2200 will forward to your NAT machine's port 22

Answer 5

ShellInABox implements a web-based console that can be used for logging in to your system. All you need is a browser. From the project description:

Shell In A Box implements a web server that can export arbitrary command line tools to a web based terminal emulator. This emulator is accessible to any JavaScript and CSS enabled web browser and does not require any additional browser plugins.

I've run this myself and it's worked out great. I only use it occasionally (e.g., when I'm visiting friends/relative and need to log in and don't have an ssh client handy), but it works great even with curses applications like Mutt and Pine.