how to start sshd manually ?

[continuum]

A host was updated to ESXi 5 from version 4.
All GUI options give the impression that sshd is running but ps | grep sshd shows that it is not.
How can we start sshd manually in such a case ?

[nielse]

How did you do the ps? If you are still logged on did you try /etc/init.d/SSH restart of /etc/init.d/SSH start ?

[continuum]

doing that gives the answer
SSH login enabled

but does not change anything - sshd is still not running

@ aravinds
that kb does not apply to esxi5

[SunilSaini]

Hi

can you find the 22 port in th output of the command

# netstat -ant |grep 22

if 22 port is availabe it means another process is using the same port. Please shutdown the process and restart the service and enjoy.

[continuum]

thanks for the suggestion but netstat does not exist in ESXi 5

anayway

telnet esxi5 22

executed on another host shows that nothing is listening on port 22

[continuum]

we found that
/etc/ssh/ssh_host_rsa_key and   /etc/ssh/ssh_host_dsa_key
are blank.
So the question now is how to generate new keys

[VTsukanov]

Try to

vim-cmd hostsvc/enable_ssh

&

/etc/init.d/SSH start

(+)

Instead netstat :

esxcli network ip connection list | grep 22

[continuum]

thank you
I tried that on a test host and it does not create new keys

[nielse]

You can create new keys by using:

/usr/lib/vmware/openssh/bin/ssh-keygen -t dsa

/usr/lib/vmware/openssh/bin/ssh-keygen -t rsa

[continuum]

@ nielse
thank you - that should work
I can post the result tomorrow

[VTsukanov]

Ok take a look at ks.cfg command for enabling ssh:

vim-cmd hostsvc/enable_ssh
vim-cmd hostsvc/start_ssh
vim-cmd hostsvc/enable_esx_shell
vim-cmd hostsvc/start_esx_shell

(from ESXi 5.0 and Scripted Installs)

key generation

/usr/lib/vmware/openssh/bin/ssh-keygen -q -t rsa1 -f /etc/ssh/ssh_host_rsa_key -C '' -N ''

but vim-cmd more preferable (from my point of view)

(+)

And more - on *nix system, if not exist ssh_host_rsa_key, then /etc/init.d/sshd recreated it. But in ESXi I don't see such functionality

[nielse]

The main problem is that vim-cmd will not regenerate the keys/files and therefor will fail.

So indeed playing with /usr/lib/vmware/openssh/bin/ssh-keygen will fix it :-)

[VTsukanov]

The main problem is that vim-cmd will not regenerate the keys/files and therefor will fail.

Then i don't understand why execution ks.cfg create working sshd and local shell

continuum

And check file /etc/ssh/sshd_config

[nielse]

vim-cmd will just start/stop the services but it will not generate the needed key files. That is also why ssh-keygen is part of the ks.cfg, this will generate the keys which are needed :-)

Basicly vim-cmd is an alias to the init files which are also in /etc/init.d (even tho you SHOULD use vim-cmd).

[nielse]

Also keep in mind that ESXi runs on BusyBox which is a very light shell which explains why a lot of usefull commands won't work (for eg netstat).

[continuum]

Nielse - sshd is running again.
Thank you

[rickardnobel]

Niels Engelen wrote:

Also keep in mind that ESXi runs on BusyBox which is a very light shell which explains why a lot of usefull commands won't work (for eg netstat).

There is actually (almost) netstat in the ESXi shell, however through the esxcli command.

See this blog post.

[aravinds3107]

You can check this KB and see if it helps