28 ms·

Microsoft Adds an OpenSSH Client to Windows 10

793 points by awiesenhofer 9y ago

romanovcode 9y ago
Wow, took them what, 20 years? But nevertheless I'm happy. Great job
- shak77 9y ago
  Took them? Why should Windows come with an SSH client?
  - krisives 9y ago
    Why did they include it now?
  - wereHamster 9y ago
    From the article: > For years, Apple MacBooks have been the go-to choice for many admins partly because getting to a ssh shell is so easy.
  - mcintyre1994 9y ago
    How else are you going to use your Azure server? :)
    - therealmarv 9y ago
      haha, never thought of this. But you're right! :)
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
  - reificator 9y ago
    I don't work for Microsoft, but my guess would be in order to securely access a shell. (Remotely, but srsh doesn't roll off the tongue) Honestly though, I'm more interested in an SSH server for Windows. I haven't tried for many years, but last time I did, getting something more secure than telnet was a massive pain.
    - barrkel 9y ago
      I run Cygwin sshd - I wouldn't expose it to the internet, but have no qualms about using it after hopping through a Linux box.
      - reificator 9y ago
        Yeah. My memory is fuzzy... I think I got to that step, but I couldn't figure out how to have it start with the machine without a bunch of hoops and caveats. But that was many years ago and I could be mixing it up with something else.
        barrkel 9y ago
        It's very simple these days - there's a script, `ssh-host-config`, which asks a number of questions (like whether you want user isolation for the service or not) and installs the service as native Windows service (using cygrunsrv).
    - pmontra 9y ago
      I'm using this in production on a Windows Server 2016 https://github.com/PowerShell/Win32-OpenSSH/wiki/Install-Win32-OpenSSH https://github.com/PowerShell/Win32-OpenSSH/wiki/Install-Win... It works but I never managed to connect to it using public/private keys, only username and password. Luckily I don't have to type them: sshpass -f password.txt user@windows.host "powershell Stop-Computer" It would be great if at least Windows Server came with a built in ssh server.
      - j_s 9y ago
        Maybe this is because key auth requires domain\username@host (doesn't resolve the domain automagically)? https://github.com/PowerShell/Win32-OpenSSH/issues/420#issuecomment-306592145 https://github.com/PowerShell/Win32-OpenSSH/issues/420#issue...
    - da_chicken 9y ago
      Why? If you're on Windows and managing Windows, you just use WinRM for a PowerShell session. Even then, though, most of the tools support RPC so your tools already communicate with remote systems. "No SSH" doesn't mean "no remote management capability." SSH hasn't been available because you don't need it unless you need to manage a Linux system or a network device. The only reason it's being introduced now is because people like to use git, and git fucking sucks if you're not in a POSIX environment.
  - extra88 9y ago
    For the same reason Windows came with a telnet client?
    - peterwwillis 9y ago
      This. Every router for the past 10 years has shipped with an SSH client. If you wanted to login to it securely from a Windows box, you had to download Putty first, or enable some janky self-signed web interface.
muxator 9y ago
If one's necessities are not limited to an ssh client, Cygwin has been available for years, is free software, and has a very good integration with Windows (you have read/write access to the whole filesystem, for example, something presently cannot be done with win10 subsystem for Linux)
- tiernano 9y ago
  the WSL does have full access to the file system... cd /mnt/c/ gets you access to the C drive...
  - discreditable 9y ago
    It can't work with network shares or non-ntfs volumes though.
    - tiernano 9y ago
      you know, i just noticed this... my ExFAT SD Card is not visible... hmmm....
      - satori99 9y ago
        I think this is because WSL uses NTFS Alternate data streams to store linux file attributes, and they don't survive when a file is copied to a non-NTFS file system.
        sz4kerto 9y ago
        No, I don't think so. Alternate streams are only used inside the emulated Linux filesystem, not externally.
      - jstarks 9y ago
        You may have to mount it manually.
    - rhpistole 9y ago
michaelbrooks 9y ago
Ever since Windows 10 was released, you could download and install the OpenSSH client. It's great that Microsoft has actually built this in now (even if it is beta).
chrismorgan 9y ago
Does it include an SSH agent to replace Pageant? And preferably with WSL integration?
- lucastheisen 9y ago
  I haven't tried the os feature version, but I assume it is the same one you can install from chocolatey... If so, then yes, it has ssh-agent.
ijustdontcare 9y ago
Great stuff, now windows malware can use ssh to infect Linux servers!
- pdpi 9y ago
  If SSH connectivity was a major reason why Windows malware couldn't propagate to Linux servers, we'd be in very deep shit already.
  - ijustdontcare 9y ago
    you miss the point that the right ssh keys will be used by default. currently malware would have to search for and use the keys by itself. now the servers will be on a gold platter, ready to be served
    - simias 9y ago
      What makes you believe that? Is malware targeting putty common?
- gaius 9y ago
  Well, no more than Heartbleed would allow Linux to infect Windows servers...
bob_roboto 9y ago
Ultimately this probably helps increase the overall internet security. Although in recent years it was available from a TLS secured source [0], the putty.org site (which might or might not be operated by the maintainers) is still not https secured. Given that probably tens or hundreds of thousands downloaded it from there (imagine, getting an SSH client from an unknown source!) I'm surprised not more happened. Other than that, thanks for the great work maintaining this project which helped me and others a great deal throughout my career. Countless times have I been stranded on a Windows server and quickly needed an SSH client. [0]https://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/latest.html https://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/latest.ht...
- huhtenberg 9y ago
  Putty binaries are all signed, which is what you should be looking at when authenticating a release. Whether you fetch them over SSL is of little importance.
  - bob_roboto 9y ago
    You are, of course, absolutely correct. And I hope this is what internal package maintainers in large companies and individuals using putty as their standard SSH client do. However, for many of us putty is a backup when they are not on their linux/osx machine and just quickly need an SSH client to do something. The workflow there is google->putty->first result->download->execute. You absolutely shouldn't, but we also shouldn't drink and sleep 8h a night :)
    - ultrafilter 9y ago
      I put a copy of putty at a short but private url at my own domain so that I can get it over https.
  - kuschku 9y ago
    That still allows an attacker to deliver you an older binary than you previously had installed — potentially one with major vulnerabilities. Signing doesn't prevent downgrade attacks, HTTPS does.
nottorp 9y ago
I wonder if it has some "convenient" extensions to the ssh protocol that will only be available on Windows... At least they can't afford intentional incompatibilities in this case.
- WalterGR 9y ago
  I wonder if it has some "convenient" extensions to the ssh protocol that will only be available on Windows... Does it, or is this FUD? The source code is available.
  - nottorp 9y ago
    Unfortunately I am somewhat older and I am cursed with a very good memory. The behaviour I describe in the OP used to be the standard for Microsoft. Feel free to audit the source code if you want, I'm not using Windows any more so I don't really care.
orlovs 9y ago
There is clear direction where MS heads. Can’t wait the moment when they will replace WSman over SSL to native SSH
kabes 9y ago
"For years, Apple MacBooks have been the go-to choice for many admins partly because getting to a ssh shell is so easy." I really can't believe somebody ever bought a MacBook because they found installing putty too much of hassle.
- mgiannopoulos 9y ago
  Admins can not install stuff , it's quite known /s
  - thinkMOAR 9y ago
    Admins cannot install stuff? Then who can? :)
    - mgiannopoulos 9y ago
      I guess the /s was not clear to indicate my attempt at humour :)
      - thinkMOAR 9y ago
        ah no, /s was unknown to me; also hard to google, what does it stand for example? /serious?
        mgiannopoulos 9y ago
        It's short for /sarcasm
- realusername 9y ago
  It's not only about this, you needed to install more and more things every year in windows for it to work. You needed to install Cygwin, a proper terminal (cmd.exe isn't exactly usable), python libraries, Putty, now Docker... Not to mention that since developers are only using Linux and Mac, you will have libraries which does not work on windows (because nobody even tried).
rando444 9y ago
Seems like they're missing support for a lot of algorithms. It's a good step to be sure, but not a replacement for Putty by any means.
- tankenmate 9y ago
  Which algorithms are they missing?
  - rando444 9y ago
    ecdh-sha2-nistp256,ecdh-sha2-nistp384,ecdh-sha2-nistp521,diffie-hellman-group-exchange-sha256,diffie-hellman-group-exchange-sha1,diffie-hellman-group14-sha1,diffie-hellman-group1-sha1 without these you'll likely be unable to connect to Cisco devices, vCenter, etc.
    - majewsky 9y ago
      I never thought I'd say that, but maybe Microsoft needs to work more on backwards compatibility. :)
    - simias 9y ago
      The SHA1 variants are deprecated on modern OpenSSH as well, although they're still supported if you explicitly enable them. I agree that it would be nice to have them "opt-in" in Windows as well, in my experience a significant amount of legacy equipment still uses these deprecated algorithms.
orlovs 9y ago
Can’t wait when the WSman in powershell will be replaced with SSH. This is one of the obstacles for PS for Linux, due lack out of the box
dingo_bat 9y ago
Can we finally proclaim 2017 as the year of the Linux desktop?
- dep_b 9y ago
  If it wasn't proclaimed yet that would be the first time in 15 years or so. Don't break the chain!
- majewsky 9y ago
  2017 was certainly the year of Linux on the Windows desktop. :)
- mxuribe 9y ago
  No, i think you meant that 2017 was the year of linux ideas that were implemented on desktops. ;-)
xaldir 9y ago
Looks like there's a server too, sounds good.
nerflad 9y ago
I'm interested how well the client works under cmd.exe. Last I tried to use ssh via cygwin, I remember having a lot of issues with escape codes not working, to the point that I had to go ahead and install puTTY anyway, just because it was a much better terminal emulator. Microsoft has neglected their terminal emulator for 20 years now[0]. I hope they improve it soon. I'm aware that some cosmetic features were added in Windows 10 but frankly it still sucks compared to even the most basic Unix terminals. Making the terminal a first class citizen in Windows would do a lot to win developer market share.
- moomin 9y ago
  You’re right, and I think Microsoft are finally listening. The terminal itself has had its first true upgrade in decades recently.
  - tootie 9y ago
    PowerShell has been around forever and it's super powerful. Just never got much adoption.
    - mixmastamyk 9y ago
      Terminal and shell are two different things.
      - deleted 9y ago
        [deleted]
- zeusk 9y ago
  You're missing [0] As for the terminal, it went under quite a revamp for lxss support (linux subsystem / Windows Subsystem for Linux)
  - nerflad 9y ago
    Oops, that was supposed to be a a footnote (just my acknowledgement that there had been some changes to cmd for Windows 10), but I decided to put it inline. Can't edit with the HN app I'm using currently.
technofiend 9y ago
Although it's appreciated as a UNIX admin I can honestly say I don't use Windows by choice but because my enterprise says I must. That's partially because all the productivity tools are found there and partially because the desktop guys are massive Microsoft bigots and refuse to host anything else. (It's OK I can say that as a massive UNIX bigot and besides they'll tell you the same.) And frankly with the tiniest bit of effort I can crank up a local xterm and then ssh which gives me lovely things like color, font choice, easy window size changes and thousands of lines of scrollback. Why in 2017 would I want to use a bare naked ssh client unless there is simply no other choice?
- tjoff 9y ago
  Default packages are extremely important. That you can walk up to any computer and get work done without installing anything, even downloading putty.exe is far too much effort in some cases. Also it is kind of rude to just download and execute things on friends/colleagues computers ad hoc. If this will be installed by default it will be awesome, and imho even the process described here by enabling a feature is still better than putty.exe (it will get managed by windows and updated if need be etc.). For my own windows computers though, the first thing I install is WSL and a proper terminal app (cmder).
  - technofiend 9y ago
    Yeah it's handy to have by default, no doubt. But unless it also includes all the other client modes as well (scp, sftp, etc) and all the features found in Putty to boot I think the author's conclusion that Putty's days are numbered is a bit unrealistic. I will say if this includes active directory integration so that ssh'ing from a windows box to a kerberos-protected unix one that could be slightly helpful. And if not that's just another reason to keep using putty. LOL.
  - jenscow 9y ago
    Downloading putty.exe (or executing on a USB or share) is less invasive than installing the OpenSSH client feature.
qplex 9y ago
Great. Microsoft. That's just great. Now could you please remove the spy/adware that is also included in Windows 10?
- jasonkostempski 9y ago
  Even if they did, would you ever trust them again?
- Microsoft_ 9y ago
  No.
zaf 9y ago
It's in beta and you still have to use the bag of sh*t windows terminal. I'll skip and continue supporting and using PuTTY. The PuTTY developers should get a trophy for an essential dev tool that has been around for ages, free and just works.
profsnuggles 9y ago
1:47 video on how to install it. If you do not want to watch go to “Manage Optional Features” then + “Add a feature”. You can then scroll down the list and find the OpenSSH Client (Beta) and OpenSSH Server (Beta) features in Windows. Do you really need a video when the installation instructions are 2 sentences?
- majewsky 9y ago
  Even if the installation instructions are more than 2 sentences, I absolutely hate if video is the only documentation method. It has its value as a supplement to a text description, but not without the text. (The worst offender that I've come across for this stuff is Minecraft mods. I want to know how this machine block works, not watch you chat about random stuff for 30 minutes hoping that the explanation is somewhere around minute 19!)
  - johansch 9y ago
    Maybe YouTube should have a "kudos, this video was so good that I'll watch an extra 30-second ad just to thank you"-button. (I assume most of these videos are so unnecessarily long because it increases ad earnings for the content creators.)
- gpvos 9y ago
  I'm not seeing the OpenSSH client there. Is there a minimum version of Windows 10 that's needed?
  - Someone1234 9y ago
    You have to join Windows Insider preview program to get it today. Should be in retail when the current build is released.
- jenscow 9y ago
  Yeh, at least provide a command-line method of installing it. If you're the type to install ssh, I'm guessing you're not a typical Windows user who is horrified by the command-prompt.
JepZ 9y ago
Yeah, they probably found out that sending the data from their own adware/spyware over unencrypted channels back to their own servers was too insecure. just kidding ;-) No seriously: Congratulations MS and please evaluate again if you really need that extra money you make with your advertising deals.
j_s 9y ago
If open source isn't a requirement and you want a polished GUI client, https://www.bitvise.com/ssh-client https://www.bitvise.com/ssh-client has been free as in beer for about 1.5 years. It will be tough for them to beat being part of the default install! Odd licensing (free for up to 4 users/machines, but crossing to 5 required $45/seat) really crimped adoption before the license was changed. https://web.archive.org/web/20160329203117/https://www.bitvise.com/ssh-client-pricing https://web.archive.org/web/20160329203117/https://www.bitvi... Bitvise sells a solid Windows-friendly SSH server for $100. I am not affiliated apart from being a happy user since before OpenSSH supported AuthenticationMethods (multiple required) in 2013; it has been my straightforward licensing alternative to Remote Desktop Gateway.
- ConfucianNardin 9y ago
  They're also squatting the putty.org domain to advertise their software, which is pretty bad-mannered.
  - j_s 9y ago
    Thanks for pointing this out; I'd forgotten about that (having given up on Putty after discovering the difficulty of sharing configuration https://stackoverflow.com/q/13023920 https://stackoverflow.com/q/13023920). Putty.org links to the Putty download page with a disclaimer separating promotion of Bitvise software below. The contrast in marketing language between "source code [...] developed and supported by a group of volunteers" vs. "developed and supported professionally" definitely appeals directly to the Windows mindset! Unfortunately Bitvise's "growth hacking" makes commercial sense, even if it does cost them potential users. It is always interesting to contrast various SEO approaches; for example: contrasting https://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty https://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty and https://winscp.net https://winscp.net. It would be neat if the Putty author would chime in here; perhaps a funding drive for putty.net is in order!
unfamiliar 9y ago
What I'd really like to see is an OpenSSH server for Windows. My biggest gripe is not being able to SSH into a Windows machine and use one of the 3 major shells available now (cmd/powershell/bash).
- merb 9y ago
  it has a ssh server, too. but I do not know which shell you get after ssh'ing into (trying out right now)
- GordonS 9y ago
  If it doesn't have to be OSS, Bitvise have one that is free for personal use, otherwise available under a commercial license. Ive been using it for probably > 5 years, and it's been rock solid.runs as a Windows service, supports both Windows and custom credentials, comes with a nice GUI configuration tool too, can highly recommend it.
jerianasmith 9y ago
Even if installing Putty is not a hassle, i see no reason why we can't try SSH . If it makes IT admin's job easier, we should give it a try.
nailer 9y ago
I've been using this from the daily builds for a year, maybe two, to SSH into my app servers, DB boxes and load balancers and start tunnels, It works. Really well. Microsoft are going to try and get the forked Windows support merged into OpenSSH ports upstream.
nickjj 9y ago
As someone who makes online training courses, the whole putty dance for Windows was so cumbersome. This is excellent news. Personally I would recommend anyone on Windows to use WSL (which supports ssh and scp out of the box) but it's nice to see this is available for people who don't want to use WSL.
- j_s 9y ago
  > the whole putty dance for Windows Do you have something you can share publicly to demonstrate to the uninitiated how painful this has been? Putty's dedication to the Windows registry has caused me tremendous grief. Helping end users (Windows developers) configure Putty is the bane of my "discount" remote access strategy (SSH port forwarding).
  - nickjj 9y ago
    I usually point people to specific steps of this DO guide https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-use-ssh-keys-with-putty-on-digitalocean-droplets-windows-users https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-use-.... It gets even worse too because in some of my courses (like my Let's Encrypt course) I request people to securely transfer files to their DO server. So now they have to set up WinSCP or a comparable tool, which has its own set of lengthly instructions. And for comparison on MacOS, Linux or WSL it's just: Create SSH key: ssh-keygen -t rsa (hit enter a couple of times) SSH into a server: ssh user@host SCP a file to a server: scp foo.conf user@host:/tmp
hsnewman 9y ago
So this is why Microsoft is such a leader in technology. After only 22 years, ssh is now in it's operating system! Wouldn't it be nice to have a monopoly that actually is innovative, rather than simply a lackluster follower?
harry8 9y ago
anyone old enough to remember services for unix? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Services_for_UNIX https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Services_for_UNIX What happened? Will this latest attempt to be non-hostile to unix be dumped as well? No ssh server, why not?
- ForHackernews 9y ago
  It does include an SSH server. > There is a new beta feature in Windows 10 that may just see the retirement of Putty from many users: an OpenSSH client and OpenSSH server application for Windows.
znpy 9y ago
I have been using VanDyke's SecureCRT for more than a year now at work and I must say if works very, very well.
72deluxe 9y ago
I just use the ssh client within the Ubuntu thingy in Windows 10 - surely that was an option?
souenzzo 9y ago
Central store with apps, built-in ssh... Almost like Ubuntu 4.10...
- tempfs 9y ago
  Shhh. It will only be another decade or two for Microsoft to complete their ugly rewrite of Unix.
currysausage 9y ago
Maybe someday, we will even be able to type sftp://foo@bar/var/www into the Explorer address bar!
edpichler 9y ago
Microsoft is definitely other company nowadays. When I started on IT, more than a decade ago, they had a completely other market positioning and strategy.
avryhof 9y ago
The first thing I always installed in Windows was the gnu tools port. (unixutils?) Now when I sit down at a Windows box, it's the Ubuntu terminal. Over the years, I've become pretty platform agnostic. However, having to change my keyboard shortcuts for Mac, and no single way to copy/paste in a terminal between Windows (double right-click)/Mac (alternate between middle-click, or right click and paste depending on the source)/Linux (good old middle click!) is pretty annoying. It's also annoying that the Mac uses a whole different button for copy/paste, and the Home/End keys don't work the same.
pjungwir 9y ago
When I have to work on a Windows machine the first thing I install is git: https://git-scm.com/downloads https://git-scm.com/downloads It comes with bash and all the standard tools (including ssh IIRC), so I can work on a real command line. Especially as a vi user, I'm right at home. I find this a lot easier to manage than Cygwin: a lighter install, no packages to select, and smoother integration.
- tonteldoos 9y ago
  Have you looked at Mobaxterm at all? I have the same issues, and accidentally discovered this a few years ago, and haven't looked back. Lightweight Cygwin install, own package manager, EXTREMELY usable. The free version is plenty good, but even the paid for version is 'only' $80.
  - stefanpie 9y ago
    I second this recommendation. It’s a really great tool; I really like the combined SSH and FTP integration so I can browse and edit files with my favorite text editor on the machine I’m ssh’ed into really efficiently while also running commands at the same time.
  - surge 9y ago
    Also love MobaXterm I wish Cygwin performed better on Windows, git operations on Linux take minutes on Windows because it has to spin up the whole cygwin environment. This kind of still makes me want to use Linux, but MobaXTerm makes my Windows desktop very usable for administration.
  - itgoon 9y ago
    Another "me too!" for MobaXterm. Sessions in tabs, easy file transfer, built-in and automatic X forwarding. I like PuTTY, and have used it a lot, but MobaXterm has been great.
- putinontheritz 9y ago
  The problem with gitbash is its way slower. Plus, the real reason you get Putty or SecureCRT if you’re lucky, is because they are actually terminal emulators and not a DOS shell. Sorry I don’t find Mona compelling at all.
F00Fbug 9y ago
It's about time. I can't imagine (as the author asserts) that people left Windows for Apple because of the lack of a command ssh client. Here's a thought: If you need to spend time on Unix/Linux machines, why not just run that on the desktop? I've been Linux only for 10 years and have no issues. OK, I do need Windows for the rare moments where I have to collaborate on Word or PowerPoint documents; Win in a VM (KVM/QEMU) gets the job done. Does this new client support ssh-copy-id and passwordless logins? I have a couple of public-facing machines that need ssh; I refuse to enable password authentication as they'll get banged on all day!
- deadbunny 9y ago
  Because Windows is foisted upon people in corporate environments. Not everyone gets to run their OS of choice.
  - putinontheritz 9y ago
    Foisted is a very apt term
  - F00Fbug 9y ago
    Good point - as Mel Brooks said, "It's good to be the king!" In my last job, I was IT; I dread going to some place where they force Windows upon me!
    - digitalsushi 9y ago
      I work at a very corporate place with forced windows laptops. There are zero systems in the company we can sit down at and log into, except our laptops. The OS version is updated, and upgraded, automatically, even including major versions. I was just force upgraded to windows 10 and lost support for my programming environment. I had to recreate it in a new toolset because the one I have a thousand hours in is no longer supported. (It would work, it's just not supported - I cannot install it, but it would work fine if I could). One arm of my company allows macs. This one does not, period. We have a 0% non windows 10 user base. We can have temporary admin access for 12 hours if we will out a report, but everything we do is recorded. It doesnt work if we're on wifi or battery. We are not allowed to install browser extensions, even if we are developing against the web. My last job let everyone have admin/root. I had everything I ever wanted. My workflow was glorious. I was so comfortable. I was able to work 3 to 4 times faster on average, i.e. my yearly output was probably 3 to 4 times more productive. I invented new things, scratched my itches, and felt like the king of the world. But this job will let me retire.
ape4 9y ago
I needed to reboot to make the install of ssh work. Then I did `ssh linuxbox` and it tried to login me in as winuser@winbox@linuxbox instead of winuser@linuxbox. The -l option fixed that. The gtop command looked nice! - it didn't on putty.
lucaspottersky 9y ago
yep, welcome to 1999. geez.
skellertor 9y ago
Holy smokes! Why did it take them that long? This is why Microsoft loses so often. They crawl when it comes to innovation. Thank goodness for their surface line of products
- ckocagil 9y ago
  >Why did it take them that long? Because they relied on software sales to businesses, therefore incompatible tools and vendor lock-in. They're now changing their business model towards IaaS/PaaS. >This is why Microsoft loses so often. Microsoft loses how? You might not like them but they definitely haven't lost anything.
dexterdog 9y ago
All this talk about putty and I can't believe nobody has mentioned Bitvise Tunnelier. It's been my goto SSH client on Windows forever now.
dotdi 9y ago
Die putty. Die. MUHAHAHAHA.
- snvzz 9y ago
  The UX would have to be better than Putty first. Seeing as putty emulates a decent terminal, this isn't going to be trivial.
coldacid 9y ago
I prefer installing OpenSSH from Chocolatey instead, since that way I know I'm getting every month's updates. I've been using the sshd for a year now on my media server, and have the client on all my machines. It's pretty solid, although I do have one ongoing issue related to how ssh-agent works (instead of emulating UNIX domain sockets it uses Windows named pipes, and I can't make a working proxy for Windows gpg-agent to replace it so I can use my smartcard for SSH).
igtztorrero 9y ago
5 years ago I use git client, it includes a ssh client
manishsharan 9y ago
This is well and good but I wish Microsoft would take a strong stance on corporations launching MITM attacks on their employees' HTTPS sessions by injecting their SSL certificates on every session. I can understand corporations blocking sites like facebook but I don't see why they need to read everything I read on the web.
- Someone1234 9y ago
  Sounds like an issue for lawmakers or HR are your workplace, not Microsoft... Microsoft is a technology company, they aren't in charge of the HR or management at your workplace and consequently shouldn't be trying to fix HR issues using technology. There's plenty of legitimate uses for MitM-ling TLS, and in some circumstances even that is one of them (e.g. on hardened networks with VPN endpoint interconnects).
- sigzero 9y ago
  If you are on their time and their equipment, they have every right to know what you are doing. End of story.
aargh_aargh 9y ago
Built-in OpenSSH was never the problem. You could always get builds for Windows. Lack of a half-decent terminal emulator is. cmd.exe is just terrible (I assume that's what I see in the screenshot).
- jve 9y ago
  I hope you are aware that Windows 10 has improved console: https://blogs.windows.com/buildingapps/2014/10/07/console-improvements-in-the-windows-10-technical-preview/ https://blogs.windows.com/buildingapps/2014/10/07/console-im... And keeps improving: https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/commandline/tag/console/ https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/commandline/tag/console/
  - Slippery_John 9y ago
    I was happily surprised a while back when I started using WSL, but there are a few things that I still miss: * tabs * splitting a pane * a default font with a high unicode coverage * better theme support (the current system is clunky)
    - jve 9y ago
      You may get away with ConEmu then: https://rakhesh.com/windows/whee-cmder-can-do-split-panes/ https://rakhesh.com/windows/whee-cmder-can-do-split-panes/
  - aargh_aargh 9y ago
    So they finally got mouse selection working? Font size scales according to screen resolution? They must have woken up to the 21st century. Thank you for the link, I had no idea. I haven't kept tabs on the recent developments. Not sure if I'll ever upgrade to Windows 10, but I keep it in a cage somewhere, so I'll take a look.
philamonster 9y ago
Only available on 1709. No joy on LTSB :(((
death_syn 9y ago
Well, I gave this a try on my Windows machine. I tried to generate a key pair to pass around. I have yet to figure out how to give ssh-keygen a path spec it can write to. Even no path (just file name for the key in the current directory) fails with "invalid argument" So on that note, anyone know how to report bugs on this? Cursory Googling isn't turning up much.
dbolgheroni 9y ago
Dear Microsoft, great to see you are including OpenSSH as part of your own OS, it's a carefully crafted piece of software that has a lot of appeal among users. A nice follow-up is to generously contribute back to The OpenBSD Foundation. You were already a donor and, doing so, are helping further developments while being much cheaper than hiring a team all by yourself. Thank you.
samfisher83 9y ago
You can also use ubuntu bash on windows. With that you can use a ton a linux utilities.
neilsimp1 9y ago
I'm confused. I've been using https://github.com/PowerShell/Win32-OpenSSH https://github.com/PowerShell/Win32-OpenSSH for this for a long time now. Everything works well. Is this new thing somehow different? Better?
- jstarks 9y ago
  Same thing but you can install it via Windows optional features now.
cwt137 9y ago
How do I get it to use my SSH key automatically? Do I make a .ssh folder in my home folder? Which key format does it use; PuTTY or the regular format?
windoze4346 9y ago
I can't wait for the day we can accurately describe windows as a quirky Linux distro
arca_vorago 9y ago
As a sysadmin who put up with MSs crap for many years, got fed up, and went fully gnu+Linux only... Sorry Microsoft, too little too late, you are an anti-user company, and I hope your desktop share withers and dies. I'd rather see the world on osx cause at least it has a semi-decent gnu userland. I smell blood in the water with moves like this. Its time to ramp up the attack people! Step 1: rip out AD and replace with Samba4. Step 2: windows servers become Linux servers. Step 3: non-office user terminals become Linux terminals. ...
milesf 9y ago
Welcome to the 90's Microsoft. Glad you could make it. No one has used telnet for over 20 years. The fact that it took Redmond over 20 years to incorporte an SSH client proves to me that they really aren't as security conscious as they claim to be.
Zenst 9y ago
Back in the late 90's I used to carry a memory stick with VNC and putty upon that I use to tunnel a VNC connection over SSH to my home network and oven over bonded ISDN (128k which I had at the time in the UK) it was more than usable or attaching to any of my systems. Then Cygwin came of age, proved very very very useful for adding the tools windows corporate desktops missed out upon for work related activities. But in all that time, PuTTy has been a very good terminal client for SSH needs. Whilst it is good that Microsoft is adding this, it has never been a hurdle for many and those who run into a corporate wall that tough, have always been able (from the ones I've worked with and collegues) been able to circumnavigate around it :- Usually using the corporate security policies to bash the corporate desktop witch upon the head. Fight fire with fire if you can't bend the rules.
- davidcollantes 9y ago
  I am missing the point you are trying to make. For those who like -- and prefer -- GUI, Putty (or any other GUI based SSH client) will remain king. For the rest, this is very good news. It is the same client many have been using for many years under their Unix alike OS, just on Microsoft Windows.
  - Zenst 9y ago
    Point being, those who wanted SSH or unix tools under windows - there have always been options, even with the most zealous of corporate desktop policy that I have encountered and in the worst cases, you can use the corporate security policy to make that happen.
ericfrederich 9y ago
I'm not sure how useful this is by itself. It's cool that it's there for convenience, but I think I'd rather stick to either Git on Windows or Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL)
hollander 9y ago
Next step: add recognition for foreign partition formats like HFS+ and ext4. Just recognition would be a great step, something along the lines of: hey we see there are partitions on this disk; are you sure you want to format this? This instead of: Do you want to format this disk? I don't even expect that you can read or write to those partitions, which of course would be trivial to add for them. Just recognition would be great!
mark-r 9y ago
Is this a new client and server, or are they just taking advantage of the ability to run native Linux binaries?
- AlphaWeaver 9y ago
  I'd assume its windows native, considering it can run without the WSL.
dschuetz 9y ago
What could possibly go wrong?
fantasticsid 9y ago
Last I checked bash on windows is still segregated from the windows system proper. So you cannot call any windows utility/compilers from windows bash. You cannot write to existing files/directories either, based on WSL docs. Hopefully these limitations will be removed.
- AlphaWeaver 9y ago
  I don't think that's true. You've been able to execute windows tools from WSL for a while now.
  - MikusR 9y ago
    And access to file system through /mnt/c even longer.
j_s 9y ago
Haven't seen any discussion yet of the licensing aspects of accessing a Windows server via SSH. Linking an independent Microsoft licensing consultant discussing fun terms like "External Connectors" vs. "Client Access Licenses" (CALs), the "Primary User of a Windows device" and the current "Web Workload" exception... maybe a new exception is on the way. https://github.com/PowerShell/Win32-OpenSSH/issues/926#issuecomment-346871838 https://github.com/PowerShell/Win32-OpenSSH/issues/926#issue...
jgaa 9y ago
So, it took Microsoft 17 years to catch up? I ported openssh to windows in year 2000. http://download.jgaa.com/ftp/pub/OpenSSH/ http://download.jgaa.com/ftp/pub/OpenSSH/
kuon 9y ago
My main issue is the terminal emulator. MinTTY is the only I can get to work like I want with colors and fonts, but I still miss ligatures and the performances are bad. I'd really like something faster with full color and font support I can SSH from. By true color support, I mean this: https://github.com/chriskempson/base16-shell https://github.com/chriskempson/base16-shell I use it to change my colors depending on the machine I am on. If I log onto a production server, the color scheme switch to high contrast with red background.
- hirsin 9y ago
  Have you tried this out in recent Windows releases? We added 24-bit color support [1] to the console in Sep 2016, and built a colortool (that supports solarized) this summer [2]. Most of this should work, and we're all ears for things that don't. 1. https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/commandline/2016/09/22/24-bit-color-in-the-windows-console/ https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/commandline/2016/09/22/24-b... 2. https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/commandline/2017/08/11/introducing-the-windows-console-colortool/ https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/commandline/2017/08/11/intr...
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - kuon 9y ago
    Does it support setting colors via escape sequence from the shell? because that's the whole point.
    - hirsin 9y ago
      Ah, no, I don't believe so - colortool calls into kernel 32.dll to set the colors it looks like, so they're system wide. The github project linked in the second blog post would be a good spot to put a bug/feature request in though.
ifdefdebug 9y ago
> There is a new beta feature in Windows 10 that may just see the retirement of Putty from many users I don't think so. Putty is not only a superb ssh client, it's also so much better shell than command prompt.
joeyaiello 9y ago
Hey there, everyone! I'm the PM for this project, and it looks like I'm a little late to the party, but I wanted to drop in some notes to add to the discussion: * we also shipped OpenSSH's sshd server, but it's a little tricky to configure right now. Expect a blog post this week. * This is not production-ready in the current version of Windows 10 (hence the "(Beta)" in the label), but we hope to be soon. * All of this is being done in open-source out of a fork at https://github.com/powershell/Win32-OpenSSH https://github.com/powershell/Win32-OpenSSH (code work is technically checked into https://github.com/powershell/openssh-portable/ https://github.com/powershell/openssh-portable/ first, but those will be consolidated at some point). Check the Wiki there for a ton of info. * We've been working closely with the official OpenSSH Portable maintainers to get upstream at some point in the future. They've been awesome to work with so far, and we're really looking forward to moving Windows onto the definitive SSH implementation of the world. This is been a super fun project to work on over the last couple years, and I'm glad that there's such a groundswell of excitement around it. Like I said, I hope to be publishing a lot more documentation/material on our plans as we get to a production-ready state. I've also been super swamped with the release of PowerShell Core 6.0 [1] for Windows/macOS/Linux coming early next year, hence the lack of a good release announcement on these beta bits...Thanks to Patrick Kennedy for finding it and letting everyone know! :) ) [1]: https://github.com/powershell/powershell https://github.com/powershell/powershell
- dhuramas 9y ago
  Does it work with older Windows versions?
  - bringtheaction 9y ago
    Probably not. The Windows Subsystem for Linux was introduced with Windows 10.
    - chokolad 9y ago
      This is a win32 port of OpenSSH, it does not use Windows Subsystem for Linux. WSL can already run Ubuntu elf-binaries of ssh.
equalunique 9y ago
Exciting news!
firemancoder 9y ago
This seems like a small thing, but it's definitely not. As an admin one of the first things I always have to do is download Putty and pscp to whatever machine I'm on. It will be really nice to have these built in. Also being able to tie this in with applications will be a huge bonus later as well.
wensheng 9y ago
It seems it only available in Administrator mode, to enable it for normal user, you have to add "C:\Windows\System32\OpenSSH" to your PATH.
bkolics 9y ago
For the love of God, I cannot get ssh-add working with passphrase protected private keys. If there is no passphrase protection on the private key, then it works fine. I guess this is what beta means ;-)
unk 9y ago
I love that you have to dig through a list of supplemental fonts to enable the SSH client/server. Oh Microsoft.
HaoZeke 9y ago
The best terminal ssh is obviously mobaXterm.. It even supports X windows. Plus it's free. https://mobaxterm.mobatek.net/ https://mobaxterm.mobatek.net/

793 points by awiesenhofer 9y ago

romanovcode 9y ago

Wow, took them what, 20 years? But nevertheless I'm happy. Great job

shak77 9y ago
Took them? Why should Windows come with an SSH client?
- krisives 9y ago
  Why did they include it now?
- wereHamster 9y ago
  From the article: > For years, Apple MacBooks have been the go-to choice for many admins partly because getting to a ssh shell is so easy.
- mcintyre1994 9y ago
  How else are you going to use your Azure server? :)
  - therealmarv 9y ago
    haha, never thought of this. But you're right! :)
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
- reificator 9y ago
  I don't work for Microsoft, but my guess would be in order to securely access a shell. (Remotely, but srsh doesn't roll off the tongue) Honestly though, I'm more interested in an SSH server for Windows. I haven't tried for many years, but last time I did, getting something more secure than telnet was a massive pain.
  - barrkel 9y ago
    I run Cygwin sshd - I wouldn't expose it to the internet, but have no qualms about using it after hopping through a Linux box.
    - reificator 9y ago
      Yeah. My memory is fuzzy... I think I got to that step, but I couldn't figure out how to have it start with the machine without a bunch of hoops and caveats. But that was many years ago and I could be mixing it up with something else.
      - barrkel 9y ago
        It's very simple these days - there's a script, `ssh-host-config`, which asks a number of questions (like whether you want user isolation for the service or not) and installs the service as native Windows service (using cygrunsrv).
  - pmontra 9y ago
    I'm using this in production on a Windows Server 2016 https://github.com/PowerShell/Win32-OpenSSH/wiki/Install-Win32-OpenSSH https://github.com/PowerShell/Win32-OpenSSH/wiki/Install-Win... It works but I never managed to connect to it using public/private keys, only username and password. Luckily I don't have to type them: sshpass -f password.txt user@windows.host "powershell Stop-Computer" It would be great if at least Windows Server came with a built in ssh server.
    - j_s 9y ago
      Maybe this is because key auth requires domain\username@host (doesn't resolve the domain automagically)? https://github.com/PowerShell/Win32-OpenSSH/issues/420#issuecomment-306592145 https://github.com/PowerShell/Win32-OpenSSH/issues/420#issue...
  - da_chicken 9y ago
    Why? If you're on Windows and managing Windows, you just use WinRM for a PowerShell session. Even then, though, most of the tools support RPC so your tools already communicate with remote systems. "No SSH" doesn't mean "no remote management capability." SSH hasn't been available because you don't need it unless you need to manage a Linux system or a network device. The only reason it's being introduced now is because people like to use git, and git fucking sucks if you're not in a POSIX environment.
- extra88 9y ago
  For the same reason Windows came with a telnet client?
  - peterwwillis 9y ago
    This. Every router for the past 10 years has shipped with an SSH client. If you wanted to login to it securely from a Windows box, you had to download Putty first, or enable some janky self-signed web interface.

muxator 9y ago

If one's necessities are not limited to an ssh client, Cygwin has been available for years, is free software, and has a very good integration with Windows (you have read/write access to the whole filesystem, for example, something presently cannot be done with win10 subsystem for Linux)

tiernano 9y ago
the WSL does have full access to the file system... cd /mnt/c/ gets you access to the C drive...
- discreditable 9y ago
  It can't work with network shares or non-ntfs volumes though.
  - tiernano 9y ago
    you know, i just noticed this... my ExFAT SD Card is not visible... hmmm....
    - satori99 9y ago
      I think this is because WSL uses NTFS Alternate data streams to store linux file attributes, and they don't survive when a file is copied to a non-NTFS file system.
      - sz4kerto 9y ago
        No, I don't think so. Alternate streams are only used inside the emulated Linux filesystem, not externally.
    - jstarks 9y ago
      You may have to mount it manually.
  - rhpistole 9y ago

michaelbrooks 9y ago

Ever since Windows 10 was released, you could download and install the OpenSSH client. It's great that Microsoft has actually built this in now (even if it is beta).

chrismorgan 9y ago

Does it include an SSH agent to replace Pageant? And preferably with WSL integration?

lucastheisen 9y ago
I haven't tried the os feature version, but I assume it is the same one you can install from chocolatey... If so, then yes, it has ssh-agent.

ijustdontcare 9y ago

Great stuff, now windows malware can use ssh to infect Linux servers!

pdpi 9y ago
If SSH connectivity was a major reason why Windows malware couldn't propagate to Linux servers, we'd be in very deep shit already.
- ijustdontcare 9y ago
  you miss the point that the right ssh keys will be used by default. currently malware would have to search for and use the keys by itself. now the servers will be on a gold platter, ready to be served
  - simias 9y ago
    What makes you believe that? Is malware targeting putty common?
gaius 9y ago
Well, no more than Heartbleed would allow Linux to infect Windows servers...

bob_roboto 9y ago

Ultimately this probably helps increase the overall internet security. Although in recent years it was available from a TLS secured source [0], the putty.org site (which might or might not be operated by the maintainers) is still not https secured. Given that probably tens or hundreds of thousands downloaded it from there (imagine, getting an SSH client from an unknown source!) I'm surprised not more happened. Other than that, thanks for the great work maintaining this project which helped me and others a great deal throughout my career. Countless times have I been stranded on a Windows server and quickly needed an SSH client. [0]https://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/latest.html https://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/latest.ht...

huhtenberg 9y ago
Putty binaries are all signed, which is what you should be looking at when authenticating a release. Whether you fetch them over SSL is of little importance.
- bob_roboto 9y ago
  You are, of course, absolutely correct. And I hope this is what internal package maintainers in large companies and individuals using putty as their standard SSH client do. However, for many of us putty is a backup when they are not on their linux/osx machine and just quickly need an SSH client to do something. The workflow there is google->putty->first result->download->execute. You absolutely shouldn't, but we also shouldn't drink and sleep 8h a night :)
  - ultrafilter 9y ago
    I put a copy of putty at a short but private url at my own domain so that I can get it over https.
- kuschku 9y ago
  That still allows an attacker to deliver you an older binary than you previously had installed — potentially one with major vulnerabilities. Signing doesn't prevent downgrade attacks, HTTPS does.

nottorp 9y ago

I wonder if it has some "convenient" extensions to the ssh protocol that will only be available on Windows... At least they can't afford intentional incompatibilities in this case.

WalterGR 9y ago
I wonder if it has some "convenient" extensions to the ssh protocol that will only be available on Windows... Does it, or is this FUD? The source code is available.
- nottorp 9y ago
  Unfortunately I am somewhat older and I am cursed with a very good memory. The behaviour I describe in the OP used to be the standard for Microsoft. Feel free to audit the source code if you want, I'm not using Windows any more so I don't really care.

orlovs 9y ago

There is clear direction where MS heads. Can’t wait the moment when they will replace WSman over SSL to native SSH

kabes 9y ago

"For years, Apple MacBooks have been the go-to choice for many admins partly because getting to a ssh shell is so easy." I really can't believe somebody ever bought a MacBook because they found installing putty too much of hassle.

mgiannopoulos 9y ago
Admins can not install stuff , it's quite known /s
- thinkMOAR 9y ago
  Admins cannot install stuff? Then who can? :)
  - mgiannopoulos 9y ago
    I guess the /s was not clear to indicate my attempt at humour :)
    - thinkMOAR 9y ago
      ah no, /s was unknown to me; also hard to google, what does it stand for example? /serious?
      - mgiannopoulos 9y ago
        It's short for /sarcasm
realusername 9y ago
It's not only about this, you needed to install more and more things every year in windows for it to work. You needed to install Cygwin, a proper terminal (cmd.exe isn't exactly usable), python libraries, Putty, now Docker... Not to mention that since developers are only using Linux and Mac, you will have libraries which does not work on windows (because nobody even tried).

rando444 9y ago

Seems like they're missing support for a lot of algorithms. It's a good step to be sure, but not a replacement for Putty by any means.

tankenmate 9y ago
Which algorithms are they missing?
- rando444 9y ago
  ecdh-sha2-nistp256,ecdh-sha2-nistp384,ecdh-sha2-nistp521,diffie-hellman-group-exchange-sha256,diffie-hellman-group-exchange-sha1,diffie-hellman-group14-sha1,diffie-hellman-group1-sha1 without these you'll likely be unable to connect to Cisco devices, vCenter, etc.
  - majewsky 9y ago
    I never thought I'd say that, but maybe Microsoft needs to work more on backwards compatibility. :)
  - simias 9y ago
    The SHA1 variants are deprecated on modern OpenSSH as well, although they're still supported if you explicitly enable them. I agree that it would be nice to have them "opt-in" in Windows as well, in my experience a significant amount of legacy equipment still uses these deprecated algorithms.

orlovs 9y ago

Can’t wait when the WSman in powershell will be replaced with SSH. This is one of the obstacles for PS for Linux, due lack out of the box

dingo_bat 9y ago

Can we finally proclaim 2017 as the year of the Linux desktop?

dep_b 9y ago
If it wasn't proclaimed yet that would be the first time in 15 years or so. Don't break the chain!
majewsky 9y ago
2017 was certainly the year of Linux on the Windows desktop. :)
mxuribe 9y ago
No, i think you meant that 2017 was the year of linux ideas that were implemented on desktops. ;-)

xaldir 9y ago

Looks like there's a server too, sounds good.

nerflad 9y ago

I'm interested how well the client works under cmd.exe. Last I tried to use ssh via cygwin, I remember having a lot of issues with escape codes not working, to the point that I had to go ahead and install puTTY anyway, just because it was a much better terminal emulator. Microsoft has neglected their terminal emulator for 20 years now[0]. I hope they improve it soon. I'm aware that some cosmetic features were added in Windows 10 but frankly it still sucks compared to even the most basic Unix terminals. Making the terminal a first class citizen in Windows would do a lot to win developer market share.

moomin 9y ago
You’re right, and I think Microsoft are finally listening. The terminal itself has had its first true upgrade in decades recently.
- tootie 9y ago
  PowerShell has been around forever and it's super powerful. Just never got much adoption.
  - mixmastamyk 9y ago
    Terminal and shell are two different things.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
zeusk 9y ago
You're missing [0] As for the terminal, it went under quite a revamp for lxss support (linux subsystem / Windows Subsystem for Linux)
- nerflad 9y ago
  Oops, that was supposed to be a a footnote (just my acknowledgement that there had been some changes to cmd for Windows 10), but I decided to put it inline. Can't edit with the HN app I'm using currently.

technofiend 9y ago

Although it's appreciated as a UNIX admin I can honestly say I don't use Windows by choice but because my enterprise says I must. That's partially because all the productivity tools are found there and partially because the desktop guys are massive Microsoft bigots and refuse to host anything else. (It's OK I can say that as a massive UNIX bigot and besides they'll tell you the same.) And frankly with the tiniest bit of effort I can crank up a local xterm and then ssh which gives me lovely things like color, font choice, easy window size changes and thousands of lines of scrollback. Why in 2017 would I want to use a bare naked ssh client unless there is simply no other choice?

tjoff 9y ago
Default packages are extremely important. That you can walk up to any computer and get work done without installing anything, even downloading putty.exe is far too much effort in some cases. Also it is kind of rude to just download and execute things on friends/colleagues computers ad hoc. If this will be installed by default it will be awesome, and imho even the process described here by enabling a feature is still better than putty.exe (it will get managed by windows and updated if need be etc.). For my own windows computers though, the first thing I install is WSL and a proper terminal app (cmder).
- technofiend 9y ago
  Yeah it's handy to have by default, no doubt. But unless it also includes all the other client modes as well (scp, sftp, etc) and all the features found in Putty to boot I think the author's conclusion that Putty's days are numbered is a bit unrealistic. I will say if this includes active directory integration so that ssh'ing from a windows box to a kerberos-protected unix one that could be slightly helpful. And if not that's just another reason to keep using putty. LOL.
- jenscow 9y ago
  Downloading putty.exe (or executing on a USB or share) is less invasive than installing the OpenSSH client feature.

qplex 9y ago

Great. Microsoft. That's just great. Now could you please remove the spy/adware that is also included in Windows 10?

jasonkostempski 9y ago
Even if they did, would you ever trust them again?
Microsoft_ 9y ago
No.

zaf 9y ago

It's in beta and you still have to use the bag of sh*t windows terminal. I'll skip and continue supporting and using PuTTY. The PuTTY developers should get a trophy for an essential dev tool that has been around for ages, free and just works.

profsnuggles 9y ago

1:47 video on how to install it. If you do not want to watch go to “Manage Optional Features” then + “Add a feature”. You can then scroll down the list and find the OpenSSH Client (Beta) and OpenSSH Server (Beta) features in Windows. Do you really need a video when the installation instructions are 2 sentences?

majewsky 9y ago
Even if the installation instructions are more than 2 sentences, I absolutely hate if video is the only documentation method. It has its value as a supplement to a text description, but not without the text. (The worst offender that I've come across for this stuff is Minecraft mods. I want to know how this machine block works, not watch you chat about random stuff for 30 minutes hoping that the explanation is somewhere around minute 19!)
- johansch 9y ago
  Maybe YouTube should have a "kudos, this video was so good that I'll watch an extra 30-second ad just to thank you"-button. (I assume most of these videos are so unnecessarily long because it increases ad earnings for the content creators.)
gpvos 9y ago
I'm not seeing the OpenSSH client there. Is there a minimum version of Windows 10 that's needed?
- Someone1234 9y ago
  You have to join Windows Insider preview program to get it today. Should be in retail when the current build is released.
jenscow 9y ago
Yeh, at least provide a command-line method of installing it. If you're the type to install ssh, I'm guessing you're not a typical Windows user who is horrified by the command-prompt.

JepZ 9y ago

Yeah, they probably found out that sending the data from their own adware/spyware over unencrypted channels back to their own servers was too insecure. just kidding ;-) No seriously: Congratulations MS and please evaluate again if you really need that extra money you make with your advertising deals.

j_s 9y ago

If open source isn't a requirement and you want a polished GUI client, https://www.bitvise.com/ssh-client https://www.bitvise.com/ssh-client has been free as in beer for about 1.5 years. It will be tough for them to beat being part of the default install! Odd licensing (free for up to 4 users/machines, but crossing to 5 required $45/seat) really crimped adoption before the license was changed. https://web.archive.org/web/20160329203117/https://www.bitvise.com/ssh-client-pricing https://web.archive.org/web/20160329203117/https://www.bitvi... Bitvise sells a solid Windows-friendly SSH server for $100. I am not affiliated apart from being a happy user since before OpenSSH supported AuthenticationMethods (multiple required) in 2013; it has been my straightforward licensing alternative to Remote Desktop Gateway.

ConfucianNardin 9y ago
They're also squatting the putty.org domain to advertise their software, which is pretty bad-mannered.
- j_s 9y ago
  Thanks for pointing this out; I'd forgotten about that (having given up on Putty after discovering the difficulty of sharing configuration https://stackoverflow.com/q/13023920 https://stackoverflow.com/q/13023920). Putty.org links to the Putty download page with a disclaimer separating promotion of Bitvise software below. The contrast in marketing language between "source code [...] developed and supported by a group of volunteers" vs. "developed and supported professionally" definitely appeals directly to the Windows mindset! Unfortunately Bitvise's "growth hacking" makes commercial sense, even if it does cost them potential users. It is always interesting to contrast various SEO approaches; for example: contrasting https://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty https://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty and https://winscp.net https://winscp.net. It would be neat if the Putty author would chime in here; perhaps a funding drive for putty.net is in order!

unfamiliar 9y ago

What I'd really like to see is an OpenSSH server for Windows. My biggest gripe is not being able to SSH into a Windows machine and use one of the 3 major shells available now (cmd/powershell/bash).

merb 9y ago
it has a ssh server, too. but I do not know which shell you get after ssh'ing into (trying out right now)
GordonS 9y ago
If it doesn't have to be OSS, Bitvise have one that is free for personal use, otherwise available under a commercial license. Ive been using it for probably > 5 years, and it's been rock solid.runs as a Windows service, supports both Windows and custom credentials, comes with a nice GUI configuration tool too, can highly recommend it.

jerianasmith 9y ago

Even if installing Putty is not a hassle, i see no reason why we can't try SSH . If it makes IT admin's job easier, we should give it a try.

nailer 9y ago

I've been using this from the daily builds for a year, maybe two, to SSH into my app servers, DB boxes and load balancers and start tunnels, It works. Really well. Microsoft are going to try and get the forked Windows support merged into OpenSSH ports upstream.

nickjj 9y ago

As someone who makes online training courses, the whole putty dance for Windows was so cumbersome. This is excellent news. Personally I would recommend anyone on Windows to use WSL (which supports ssh and scp out of the box) but it's nice to see this is available for people who don't want to use WSL.

j_s 9y ago
> the whole putty dance for Windows Do you have something you can share publicly to demonstrate to the uninitiated how painful this has been? Putty's dedication to the Windows registry has caused me tremendous grief. Helping end users (Windows developers) configure Putty is the bane of my "discount" remote access strategy (SSH port forwarding).
- nickjj 9y ago
  I usually point people to specific steps of this DO guide https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-use-ssh-keys-with-putty-on-digitalocean-droplets-windows-users https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-use-.... It gets even worse too because in some of my courses (like my Let's Encrypt course) I request people to securely transfer files to their DO server. So now they have to set up WinSCP or a comparable tool, which has its own set of lengthly instructions. And for comparison on MacOS, Linux or WSL it's just: Create SSH key: ssh-keygen -t rsa (hit enter a couple of times) SSH into a server: ssh user@host SCP a file to a server: scp foo.conf user@host:/tmp

hsnewman 9y ago

So this is why Microsoft is such a leader in technology. After only 22 years, ssh is now in it's operating system! Wouldn't it be nice to have a monopoly that actually is innovative, rather than simply a lackluster follower?

harry8 9y ago

anyone old enough to remember services for unix? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Services_for_UNIX https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Services_for_UNIX What happened? Will this latest attempt to be non-hostile to unix be dumped as well? No ssh server, why not?

ForHackernews 9y ago
It does include an SSH server. > There is a new beta feature in Windows 10 that may just see the retirement of Putty from many users: an OpenSSH client and OpenSSH server application for Windows.

znpy 9y ago

I have been using VanDyke's SecureCRT for more than a year now at work and I must say if works very, very well.

72deluxe 9y ago

I just use the ssh client within the Ubuntu thingy in Windows 10 - surely that was an option?

souenzzo 9y ago

Central store with apps, built-in ssh... Almost like Ubuntu 4.10...

tempfs 9y ago
Shhh. It will only be another decade or two for Microsoft to complete their ugly rewrite of Unix.

currysausage 9y ago

Maybe someday, we will even be able to type sftp://foo@bar/var/www into the Explorer address bar!

edpichler 9y ago

Microsoft is definitely other company nowadays. When I started on IT, more than a decade ago, they had a completely other market positioning and strategy.

avryhof 9y ago

The first thing I always installed in Windows was the gnu tools port. (unixutils?) Now when I sit down at a Windows box, it's the Ubuntu terminal. Over the years, I've become pretty platform agnostic. However, having to change my keyboard shortcuts for Mac, and no single way to copy/paste in a terminal between Windows (double right-click)/Mac (alternate between middle-click, or right click and paste depending on the source)/Linux (good old middle click!) is pretty annoying. It's also annoying that the Mac uses a whole different button for copy/paste, and the Home/End keys don't work the same.

pjungwir 9y ago

When I have to work on a Windows machine the first thing I install is git: https://git-scm.com/downloads https://git-scm.com/downloads It comes with bash and all the standard tools (including ssh IIRC), so I can work on a real command line. Especially as a vi user, I'm right at home. I find this a lot easier to manage than Cygwin: a lighter install, no packages to select, and smoother integration.

tonteldoos 9y ago
Have you looked at Mobaxterm at all? I have the same issues, and accidentally discovered this a few years ago, and haven't looked back. Lightweight Cygwin install, own package manager, EXTREMELY usable. The free version is plenty good, but even the paid for version is 'only' $80.
- stefanpie 9y ago
  I second this recommendation. It’s a really great tool; I really like the combined SSH and FTP integration so I can browse and edit files with my favorite text editor on the machine I’m ssh’ed into really efficiently while also running commands at the same time.
- surge 9y ago
  Also love MobaXterm I wish Cygwin performed better on Windows, git operations on Linux take minutes on Windows because it has to spin up the whole cygwin environment. This kind of still makes me want to use Linux, but MobaXTerm makes my Windows desktop very usable for administration.
- itgoon 9y ago
  Another "me too!" for MobaXterm. Sessions in tabs, easy file transfer, built-in and automatic X forwarding. I like PuTTY, and have used it a lot, but MobaXterm has been great.
putinontheritz 9y ago
The problem with gitbash is its way slower. Plus, the real reason you get Putty or SecureCRT if you’re lucky, is because they are actually terminal emulators and not a DOS shell. Sorry I don’t find Mona compelling at all.

F00Fbug 9y ago

It's about time. I can't imagine (as the author asserts) that people left Windows for Apple because of the lack of a command ssh client. Here's a thought: If you need to spend time on Unix/Linux machines, why not just run that on the desktop? I've been Linux only for 10 years and have no issues. OK, I do need Windows for the rare moments where I have to collaborate on Word or PowerPoint documents; Win in a VM (KVM/QEMU) gets the job done. Does this new client support ssh-copy-id and passwordless logins? I have a couple of public-facing machines that need ssh; I refuse to enable password authentication as they'll get banged on all day!

deadbunny 9y ago
Because Windows is foisted upon people in corporate environments. Not everyone gets to run their OS of choice.
- putinontheritz 9y ago
  Foisted is a very apt term
- F00Fbug 9y ago
  Good point - as Mel Brooks said, "It's good to be the king!" In my last job, I was IT; I dread going to some place where they force Windows upon me!
  - digitalsushi 9y ago
    I work at a very corporate place with forced windows laptops. There are zero systems in the company we can sit down at and log into, except our laptops. The OS version is updated, and upgraded, automatically, even including major versions. I was just force upgraded to windows 10 and lost support for my programming environment. I had to recreate it in a new toolset because the one I have a thousand hours in is no longer supported. (It would work, it's just not supported - I cannot install it, but it would work fine if I could). One arm of my company allows macs. This one does not, period. We have a 0% non windows 10 user base. We can have temporary admin access for 12 hours if we will out a report, but everything we do is recorded. It doesnt work if we're on wifi or battery. We are not allowed to install browser extensions, even if we are developing against the web. My last job let everyone have admin/root. I had everything I ever wanted. My workflow was glorious. I was so comfortable. I was able to work 3 to 4 times faster on average, i.e. my yearly output was probably 3 to 4 times more productive. I invented new things, scratched my itches, and felt like the king of the world. But this job will let me retire.

ape4 9y ago

I needed to reboot to make the install of ssh work. Then I did `ssh linuxbox` and it tried to login me in as winuser@winbox@linuxbox instead of winuser@linuxbox. The -l option fixed that. The gtop command looked nice! - it didn't on putty.

lucaspottersky 9y ago

yep, welcome to 1999. geez.

skellertor 9y ago

Holy smokes! Why did it take them that long? This is why Microsoft loses so often. They crawl when it comes to innovation. Thank goodness for their surface line of products

ckocagil 9y ago
>Why did it take them that long? Because they relied on software sales to businesses, therefore incompatible tools and vendor lock-in. They're now changing their business model towards IaaS/PaaS. >This is why Microsoft loses so often. Microsoft loses how? You might not like them but they definitely haven't lost anything.

dexterdog 9y ago

All this talk about putty and I can't believe nobody has mentioned Bitvise Tunnelier. It's been my goto SSH client on Windows forever now.

dotdi 9y ago

Die putty. Die. MUHAHAHAHA.

snvzz 9y ago
The UX would have to be better than Putty first. Seeing as putty emulates a decent terminal, this isn't going to be trivial.

coldacid 9y ago

I prefer installing OpenSSH from Chocolatey instead, since that way I know I'm getting every month's updates. I've been using the sshd for a year now on my media server, and have the client on all my machines. It's pretty solid, although I do have one ongoing issue related to how ssh-agent works (instead of emulating UNIX domain sockets it uses Windows named pipes, and I can't make a working proxy for Windows gpg-agent to replace it so I can use my smartcard for SSH).

igtztorrero 9y ago

5 years ago I use git client, it includes a ssh client

manishsharan 9y ago

This is well and good but I wish Microsoft would take a strong stance on corporations launching MITM attacks on their employees' HTTPS sessions by injecting their SSL certificates on every session. I can understand corporations blocking sites like facebook but I don't see why they need to read everything I read on the web.

Someone1234 9y ago
Sounds like an issue for lawmakers or HR are your workplace, not Microsoft... Microsoft is a technology company, they aren't in charge of the HR or management at your workplace and consequently shouldn't be trying to fix HR issues using technology. There's plenty of legitimate uses for MitM-ling TLS, and in some circumstances even that is one of them (e.g. on hardened networks with VPN endpoint interconnects).
sigzero 9y ago
If you are on their time and their equipment, they have every right to know what you are doing. End of story.

aargh_aargh 9y ago

Built-in OpenSSH was never the problem. You could always get builds for Windows. Lack of a half-decent terminal emulator is. cmd.exe is just terrible (I assume that's what I see in the screenshot).

jve 9y ago
I hope you are aware that Windows 10 has improved console: https://blogs.windows.com/buildingapps/2014/10/07/console-improvements-in-the-windows-10-technical-preview/ https://blogs.windows.com/buildingapps/2014/10/07/console-im... And keeps improving: https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/commandline/tag/console/ https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/commandline/tag/console/
- Slippery_John 9y ago
  I was happily surprised a while back when I started using WSL, but there are a few things that I still miss: * tabs * splitting a pane * a default font with a high unicode coverage * better theme support (the current system is clunky)
  - jve 9y ago
    You may get away with ConEmu then: https://rakhesh.com/windows/whee-cmder-can-do-split-panes/ https://rakhesh.com/windows/whee-cmder-can-do-split-panes/
- aargh_aargh 9y ago
  So they finally got mouse selection working? Font size scales according to screen resolution? They must have woken up to the 21st century. Thank you for the link, I had no idea. I haven't kept tabs on the recent developments. Not sure if I'll ever upgrade to Windows 10, but I keep it in a cage somewhere, so I'll take a look.

philamonster 9y ago

Only available on 1709. No joy on LTSB :(((

death_syn 9y ago

Well, I gave this a try on my Windows machine. I tried to generate a key pair to pass around. I have yet to figure out how to give ssh-keygen a path spec it can write to. Even no path (just file name for the key in the current directory) fails with "invalid argument" So on that note, anyone know how to report bugs on this? Cursory Googling isn't turning up much.

dbolgheroni 9y ago

Dear Microsoft, great to see you are including OpenSSH as part of your own OS, it's a carefully crafted piece of software that has a lot of appeal among users. A nice follow-up is to generously contribute back to The OpenBSD Foundation. You were already a donor and, doing so, are helping further developments while being much cheaper than hiring a team all by yourself. Thank you.

samfisher83 9y ago

You can also use ubuntu bash on windows. With that you can use a ton a linux utilities.

neilsimp1 9y ago

I'm confused. I've been using https://github.com/PowerShell/Win32-OpenSSH https://github.com/PowerShell/Win32-OpenSSH for this for a long time now. Everything works well. Is this new thing somehow different? Better?

jstarks 9y ago
Same thing but you can install it via Windows optional features now.

cwt137 9y ago

How do I get it to use my SSH key automatically? Do I make a .ssh folder in my home folder? Which key format does it use; PuTTY or the regular format?

windoze4346 9y ago

I can't wait for the day we can accurately describe windows as a quirky Linux distro

arca_vorago 9y ago

As a sysadmin who put up with MSs crap for many years, got fed up, and went fully gnu+Linux only... Sorry Microsoft, too little too late, you are an anti-user company, and I hope your desktop share withers and dies. I'd rather see the world on osx cause at least it has a semi-decent gnu userland. I smell blood in the water with moves like this. Its time to ramp up the attack people! Step 1: rip out AD and replace with Samba4. Step 2: windows servers become Linux servers. Step 3: non-office user terminals become Linux terminals. ...

milesf 9y ago

Welcome to the 90's Microsoft. Glad you could make it. No one has used telnet for over 20 years. The fact that it took Redmond over 20 years to incorporte an SSH client proves to me that they really aren't as security conscious as they claim to be.

Zenst 9y ago

Back in the late 90's I used to carry a memory stick with VNC and putty upon that I use to tunnel a VNC connection over SSH to my home network and oven over bonded ISDN (128k which I had at the time in the UK) it was more than usable or attaching to any of my systems. Then Cygwin came of age, proved very very very useful for adding the tools windows corporate desktops missed out upon for work related activities. But in all that time, PuTTy has been a very good terminal client for SSH needs. Whilst it is good that Microsoft is adding this, it has never been a hurdle for many and those who run into a corporate wall that tough, have always been able (from the ones I've worked with and collegues) been able to circumnavigate around it :- Usually using the corporate security policies to bash the corporate desktop witch upon the head. Fight fire with fire if you can't bend the rules.

davidcollantes 9y ago
I am missing the point you are trying to make. For those who like -- and prefer -- GUI, Putty (or any other GUI based SSH client) will remain king. For the rest, this is very good news. It is the same client many have been using for many years under their Unix alike OS, just on Microsoft Windows.
- Zenst 9y ago
  Point being, those who wanted SSH or unix tools under windows - there have always been options, even with the most zealous of corporate desktop policy that I have encountered and in the worst cases, you can use the corporate security policy to make that happen.

ericfrederich 9y ago

I'm not sure how useful this is by itself. It's cool that it's there for convenience, but I think I'd rather stick to either Git on Windows or Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL)

hollander 9y ago

Next step: add recognition for foreign partition formats like HFS+ and ext4. Just recognition would be a great step, something along the lines of: hey we see there are partitions on this disk; are you sure you want to format this? This instead of: Do you want to format this disk? I don't even expect that you can read or write to those partitions, which of course would be trivial to add for them. Just recognition would be great!

mark-r 9y ago

Is this a new client and server, or are they just taking advantage of the ability to run native Linux binaries?

AlphaWeaver 9y ago
I'd assume its windows native, considering it can run without the WSL.

dschuetz 9y ago

What could possibly go wrong?

fantasticsid 9y ago

Last I checked bash on windows is still segregated from the windows system proper. So you cannot call any windows utility/compilers from windows bash. You cannot write to existing files/directories either, based on WSL docs. Hopefully these limitations will be removed.

AlphaWeaver 9y ago
I don't think that's true. You've been able to execute windows tools from WSL for a while now.
- MikusR 9y ago
  And access to file system through /mnt/c even longer.

j_s 9y ago

Haven't seen any discussion yet of the licensing aspects of accessing a Windows server via SSH. Linking an independent Microsoft licensing consultant discussing fun terms like "External Connectors" vs. "Client Access Licenses" (CALs), the "Primary User of a Windows device" and the current "Web Workload" exception... maybe a new exception is on the way. https://github.com/PowerShell/Win32-OpenSSH/issues/926#issuecomment-346871838 https://github.com/PowerShell/Win32-OpenSSH/issues/926#issue...

jgaa 9y ago

So, it took Microsoft 17 years to catch up? I ported openssh to windows in year 2000. http://download.jgaa.com/ftp/pub/OpenSSH/ http://download.jgaa.com/ftp/pub/OpenSSH/

kuon 9y ago

My main issue is the terminal emulator. MinTTY is the only I can get to work like I want with colors and fonts, but I still miss ligatures and the performances are bad. I'd really like something faster with full color and font support I can SSH from. By true color support, I mean this: https://github.com/chriskempson/base16-shell https://github.com/chriskempson/base16-shell I use it to change my colors depending on the machine I am on. If I log onto a production server, the color scheme switch to high contrast with red background.

hirsin 9y ago
Have you tried this out in recent Windows releases? We added 24-bit color support [1] to the console in Sep 2016, and built a colortool (that supports solarized) this summer [2]. Most of this should work, and we're all ears for things that don't. 1. https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/commandline/2016/09/22/24-bit-color-in-the-windows-console/ https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/commandline/2016/09/22/24-b... 2. https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/commandline/2017/08/11/introducing-the-windows-console-colortool/ https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/commandline/2017/08/11/intr...
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- kuon 9y ago
  Does it support setting colors via escape sequence from the shell? because that's the whole point.
  - hirsin 9y ago
    Ah, no, I don't believe so - colortool calls into kernel 32.dll to set the colors it looks like, so they're system wide. The github project linked in the second blog post would be a good spot to put a bug/feature request in though.

ifdefdebug 9y ago

> There is a new beta feature in Windows 10 that may just see the retirement of Putty from many users I don't think so. Putty is not only a superb ssh client, it's also so much better shell than command prompt.

joeyaiello 9y ago

Hey there, everyone! I'm the PM for this project, and it looks like I'm a little late to the party, but I wanted to drop in some notes to add to the discussion: * we also shipped OpenSSH's sshd server, but it's a little tricky to configure right now. Expect a blog post this week. * This is not production-ready in the current version of Windows 10 (hence the "(Beta)" in the label), but we hope to be soon. * All of this is being done in open-source out of a fork at https://github.com/powershell/Win32-OpenSSH https://github.com/powershell/Win32-OpenSSH (code work is technically checked into https://github.com/powershell/openssh-portable/ https://github.com/powershell/openssh-portable/ first, but those will be consolidated at some point). Check the Wiki there for a ton of info. * We've been working closely with the official OpenSSH Portable maintainers to get upstream at some point in the future. They've been awesome to work with so far, and we're really looking forward to moving Windows onto the definitive SSH implementation of the world. This is been a super fun project to work on over the last couple years, and I'm glad that there's such a groundswell of excitement around it. Like I said, I hope to be publishing a lot more documentation/material on our plans as we get to a production-ready state. I've also been super swamped with the release of PowerShell Core 6.0 [1] for Windows/macOS/Linux coming early next year, hence the lack of a good release announcement on these beta bits...Thanks to Patrick Kennedy for finding it and letting everyone know! :) ) [1]: https://github.com/powershell/powershell https://github.com/powershell/powershell

dhuramas 9y ago
Does it work with older Windows versions?
- bringtheaction 9y ago
  Probably not. The Windows Subsystem for Linux was introduced with Windows 10.
  - chokolad 9y ago
    This is a win32 port of OpenSSH, it does not use Windows Subsystem for Linux. WSL can already run Ubuntu elf-binaries of ssh.

equalunique 9y ago

Exciting news!

firemancoder 9y ago

This seems like a small thing, but it's definitely not. As an admin one of the first things I always have to do is download Putty and pscp to whatever machine I'm on. It will be really nice to have these built in. Also being able to tie this in with applications will be a huge bonus later as well.

wensheng 9y ago

It seems it only available in Administrator mode, to enable it for normal user, you have to add "C:\Windows\System32\OpenSSH" to your PATH.

bkolics 9y ago

For the love of God, I cannot get ssh-add working with passphrase protected private keys. If there is no passphrase protection on the private key, then it works fine. I guess this is what beta means ;-)

unk 9y ago

I love that you have to dig through a list of supplemental fonts to enable the SSH client/server. Oh Microsoft.

HaoZeke 9y ago

The best terminal ssh is obviously mobaXterm.. It even supports X windows. Plus it's free. https://mobaxterm.mobatek.net/ https://mobaxterm.mobatek.net/