The manager of an office which I support has just moved to a house with 
virgin broadband and we have been trying to connect her to the server in 
the office, with winscp under xp and also with connect to server on a 
debian box. Total failure in both instances. At the same time I have 
been tailing the auth.log on the server and nothing comes up at all. She 
also fails just to log in with ssh.
She has tried their "support" line, but it seems they do not "support" 
winscp.
Now I can easily get into the server from here, using her credentials or 
mine, I am on a bt line broadband service.
Does anyone here know of any issues with virgin and ssh, and why this 
might not be working, and whether there is a solution.
-- 
Martin

replies to newsgroup only please.

Martin Smith wrote:
> The manager of an office which I support has just moved to a house with 
> virgin broadband and we have been trying to connect her to the server in 
> the office, with winscp under xp and also with connect to server on a 
> debian box. Total failure in both instances. At the same time I have 
> been tailing the auth.log on the server and nothing comes up at all. She 
> also fails just to log in with ssh.
> She has tried their "support" line, but it seems they do not "support" 
> winscp.

Winscp is just a fancy fTP client.

I would suspect the the office is firewalled, and you have been added as 
a 'permitted access' type thing, but she has not.

Are you on a fixed IP address? and she isn't?

I would not care top leave an FTP socket open to the whole world at all, 
frankly.

> Now I can easily get into the server from here, using her credentials or 
> mine, I am on a bt line broadband service.
> Does anyone here know of any issues with virgin and ssh, and why this 
> might not be working, and whether there is a solution.

Talk to teh sysadmins at the company: they probably know how to add her in.

Martin Smith  wrote:
> Does anyone here know of any issues with virgin and ssh, and why this 
> might not be working, and whether there is a solution.

There aren't any here, or I couldn't post this!

Try telnetting to the SSH servers on port 22.  If, after a few presses of
the return key, you don't get a message like "SSH-1.99-OpenSSH_5.0" then
there's a problem with the network.  If you do there's a problem with
configuration of the SSH client or server.

Theo

"Martin Smith"  wrote in message 
news:g7caf6$orb$1$8302bc10@news.demon.co.uk...
> The manager of an office which I support has just moved to a house with 
> virgin broadband and we have been trying to connect her to the server in 
> the office, with winscp under xp and also with connect to server on a 
> debian box. Total failure in both instances. At the same time I have been 
> tailing the auth.log on the server and nothing comes up at all. She also 
> fails just to log in with ssh.
> She has tried their "support" line, but it seems they do not "support" 
> winscp.
> Now I can easily get into the server from here, using her credentials or 
> mine, I am on a bt line broadband service.
> Does anyone here know of any issues with virgin and ssh, and why this 
> might not be working, and whether there is a solution.

My suggestion would be to set up a LAN-to-LAN VPN between the routers at the 
office and the home.  I suggests Vigor routers, but Cisco or other expensive 
ones would probably work.  The Office connection would need a static IP 
address, the home location will work with a dynamic address provided that 
the VPN is initiated from the Office and set as "always on".  A static IP at 
Home makes this easier, so you would need to get rid of Virgin and use a 
proper ISP.

The home network thus connects to the office network, all computers at one 
location can in principle see all the computers at the other.  Login should 
work from the home location in the same way as it would from another PC in 
the office.

-- 
Graham J

Martin Smith wrote:

> Does anyone here know of any issues with virgin

Where would you like to begin ?

Graham

Eeyore wrote:
> 
> Martin Smith wrote:
> 
>> Does anyone here know of any issues with virgin
> 
> Where would you like to begin ?
> 

The potential mother in law?

-- 
Adrian C

The Natural Philosopher wrote:
> Martin Smith wrote:
>> The manager of an office which I support has just moved to a house 
>> with virgin broadband and we have been trying to connect her to the 
>> server in the office, with winscp under xp and also with connect to 
>> server on a debian box. Total failure in both instances. At the same 
>> time I have been tailing the auth.log on the server and nothing comes 
>> up at all. She also fails just to log in with ssh.
>> She has tried their "support" line, but it seems they do not "support" 
>> winscp.
> 
> Winscp is just a fancy fTP client.

we are running it on port 22, as you know scp is effectively ftp over ssh

> 
> I would suspect the the office is firewalled, and you have been added as 
> a 'permitted access' type thing, but she has not.
> 
> Are you on a fixed IP address? and she isn't?

I do not know how virgin run these things to be honest and from what I 
hear of their support I do not suppose their support people do either

> 
> I would not care top leave an FTP socket open to the whole world at all, 
> frankly.

port 21 is not open

> 
>> Now I can easily get into the server from here, using her credentials 
>> or mine, I am on a bt line broadband service.
>> Does anyone here know of any issues with virgin and ssh, and why this 
>> might not be working, and whether there is a solution.
> 
> Talk to teh sysadmins at the company: they probably know how to add her in.

I am the sysadmin, I can get it using her login, no problem

-- 
Martin

replies to newsgroup only please.

Graham J wrote:
> "Martin Smith"  wrote in message 
> news:g7caf6$orb$1$8302bc10@news.demon.co.uk...
>> The manager of an office which I support has just moved to a house with 
>> virgin broadband and we have been trying to connect her to the server in 
>> the office, with winscp under xp and also with connect to server on a 
>> debian box. Total failure in both instances. At the same time I have been 
>> tailing the auth.log on the server and nothing comes up at all. She also 
>> fails just to log in with ssh.
>> She has tried their "support" line, but it seems they do not "support" 
>> winscp.
>> Now I can easily get into the server from here, using her credentials or 
>> mine, I am on a bt line broadband service.
>> Does anyone here know of any issues with virgin and ssh, and why this 
>> might not be working, and whether there is a solution.
> 
> My suggestion would be to set up a LAN-to-LAN VPN between the routers at the 
> office and the home.  I suggests Vigor routers, but Cisco or other expensive 
> ones would probably work.  The Office connection would need a static IP 
> address, the home location will work with a dynamic address provided that 
> the VPN is initiated from the Office and set as "always on".  A static IP at 
> Home makes this easier, so you would need to get rid of Virgin and use a 
> proper ISP.
> 
> The home network thus connects to the office network, all computers at one 
> location can in principle see all the computers at the other.  Login should 
> work from the home location in the same way as it would from another PC in 
> the office.

Well, the problem is that I do not know what type of modem/router is at 
her end, I got her to query the ip address of the machine itself while 
running windows and it said it was 80.xx.xx.xx so I guess it is just a 
modem, and she does not have any instructions for accessing any control 
panel that it might or might not have.
I have no idea what kind of thing they use.


> 

-- 
Martin

replies to newsgroup only please.

Adrian C wrote:

> Eeyore wrote:
> > Martin Smith wrote:
> >
> >> Does anyone here know of any issues with virgin
> >
> > Where would you like to begin ?
>
> The potential mother in law?

LOL !

Graham

[snip]

> Well, the problem is that I do not know what type of modem/router is at 
> her end, I got her to query the ip address of the machine itself while 
> running windows and it said it was 80.xx.xx.xx so I guess it is just a 
> modem, and she does not have any instructions for accessing any control 
> panel that it might or might not have.
> I have no idea what kind of thing they use.

So you should take charge of the situation and recommend some suitable 
routers ...

-- 
Graham J

On Wed, 06 Aug 2008 20:27:24 +0100, Graham J passed an empty day by
writing:

> [snip]
> 
>> Well, the problem is that I do not know what type of modem/router is at
>> her end, I got her to query the ip address of the machine itself while
>> running windows and it said it was 80.xx.xx.xx so I guess it is just a
>> modem, and she does not have any instructions for accessing any control
>> panel that it might or might not have. I have no idea what kind of
>> thing they use.
> 
> So you should take charge of the situation and recommend some suitable
> routers ...

A (modem)router does not block anything - it routes it. Blocking is done 
by a firewall. I've found C£££££££SCO Pix with bugs that mess up SMTP. I 
don't think you could put them in the lower end of the market.

The crux is this - as long as the kit is set up properly, the frames and 
packets will pass. 'Decent' may to some mean 'easy to set up'. In the 
hands of the clueless, nothing will work - and I mean that not to be rude 
to the OP, but to save the waste of money in buying more kit.

You can get it to work if you set it up right - don't believe the hype.

-- 
powered by Linux - bastardized by Window$ - 
givemespam@wibblywobblyteapot.co.uk

Klunk wrote:
> On Wed, 06 Aug 2008 20:27:24 +0100, Graham J passed an empty day by
> writing:
> 
>> [snip]
>>
>>> Well, the problem is that I do not know what type of modem/router is at
>>> her end, I got her to query the ip address of the machine itself while
>>> running windows and it said it was 80.xx.xx.xx so I guess it is just a
>>> modem, and she does not have any instructions for accessing any control
>>> panel that it might or might not have. I have no idea what kind of
>>> thing they use.
>> So you should take charge of the situation and recommend some suitable
>> routers ...
> 
> A (modem)router does not block anything - it routes it. 

so is NAT a routing or a firewall function?

it blocks ALL incoming port open requests..by default..

Martin Smith wrote:

> The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>> Martin Smith wrote:
>>> The manager of an office which I support has just moved to a house 
>>> with virgin broadband and we have been trying to connect her to the 
>>> server in the office, with winscp under xp and also with connect to 
>>> server on a debian box. Total failure in both instances. At the same 
>>> time I have been tailing the auth.log on the server and nothing comes 
>>> up at all. She also fails just to log in with ssh.
>>> She has tried their "support" line, but it seems they do not "support" 
>>> winscp.
>> 
>> Winscp is just a fancy fTP client.

No, it's a fancy scp client. It does not use the FTP protocol.

> 
> we are running it on port 22, as you know scp is effectively ftp over ssh
> 
>> 
>> I would suspect the the office is firewalled, and you have been added as 
>> a 'permitted access' type thing, but she has not.
>> 
>> Are you on a fixed IP address? and she isn't?
> 
> I do not know how virgin run these things to be honest and from what I 
> hear of their support I do not suppose their support people do either
> 
>> 
>> I would not care top leave an FTP socket open to the whole world at all, 
>> frankly.
> 
> port 21 is not open

Nor does it need to be. However, port 22 does need to be open both on the server
and on the router/firewall. Check the firewall rules in the router (if it has
any) and on the server. There's a chance that port 22 has only been opened for
your IP, or dynamic IP range.

> 
>> 
>>> Now I can easily get into the server from here, using her credentials 
>>> or mine, I am on a bt line broadband service.
>>> Does anyone here know of any issues with virgin and ssh, and why this 
>>> might not be working, and whether there is a solution.
>> 
>> Talk to teh sysadmins at the company: they probably know how to add her in.
> 
> I am the sysadmin, I can get it using her login, no problem
> 

I doubt it's anything to do with authentication at the application layer. Much
more likely a routing/firewalling problem at the network layer. What error does
she get when she tries to ssh? Can she access the office network using other
protocols e.g. HTTP to a web server? Has she tried tracert to verify packet
routing? 

-- 
Nigel Wade