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aToad #11: freeSSHd (SSH daemon for Windows)

It’s always been a nightmare to try and install OpenSSHd on Windows. The last thing I tried was this horrible guide involving cygwin, and in the end it didn’t work out, likely because I didn’t want to create a user nor to install the thing as a service.

Anyway, in the end I finally found something called freeSSHd, which reminded me a lot a of Free SMTP Server in its concept: make an equivalent of some widespread GNU software in a decently easy to install (and, incidentally, manage) Windows flavor. In both cases, unlike the name may suggest, it is not “free software” as in FLOSS or free speech, it is just freeware as in free beer. But it fills a gap, and although I wouldn’t use them for critical server applications, where I use GNU/Linux anyway, for development it’s just great.

Even though it is not as rich, and most importantly, not as up-to-date as openSSH (development seems quite slow nowadays), it features a bunch of nice useful features such as:
– SSH users independent from system users
– login via password (stored in SHA1 though) or key
– define permissions for shell, SFTP and tunneling
– IP restrictions for incoming connections
– and of course the GUI which makes it easy to use

Something worth trying if you’re looking for a quick and easy way to set up an SSH server on your Windows computer.

Posted in A Tool A Day.


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