Debian
openssh package

openssh-server should broadcast availability via avahi

Bug #387091 reported by Mario Limonciello
18
This bug affects 3 people
Affects Status Importance Assigned to Milestone
openssh (Debian)
New
Unknown
openssh (Fedora)
Won't Fix
Medium
openssh (Ubuntu)
Triaged
Wishlist
Unassigned

Bug Description

Avahi has support to advertise to a network different running services. Currently openssh doesn't advertise itself dynamically or statically when installed.

It can be done statically by copying the example file from /usr/share/doc/avahi-daemon/examples to /etc/avahi/services or by using the avahi-publish command. avahi-publish could be ran from the SSH init script, or this service file can be installed by the openssh-server package.

This can be done dynamically by patching openssh, but there would have to be a buy in from upstream to do this.

Revision history for this message
In , Bastien (bastien-redhat-bugs) wrote :

Avahi should set the TXT record for the SSH service it exports to include the public key of the SSH server (in a manner compatible with MacOS X, which does the same thing).

Revision history for this message
In , Lennart (lennart-redhat-bugs) wrote :

Uh. This is not the appropriate place to report this.

To do this properly we should patch OpenSSH to do the Avahi registration itself. But I fear the OpenSSH would not be willing to merge such a patch. Right now we do mDNS/DNS-SD publishing of the SSH service by dropping a static service definition file in /etc/avahi. It's just an xml file. Including the SSH server key in that file automatically is not really possible.

I am reassigning this now to ssh, let's see what the ssh maintainers have to say about this.

Revision history for this message
In , Tomas (tomas-redhat-bugs) wrote :

I don't know much about the potential avahi registration code, that means what dependencies it would bring to openssh and so on.

But I am really afraid this code would not be accepted upstream especially if some of the dependencies would be GPL licensed.

Revision history for this message
In , Lennart (lennart-redhat-bugs) wrote :

It would pull in libavahi-client which is LGPL. la-c pulls in D-Bus. Which is GPL & Academic.

Also, that dependency would be completely optional.

I'd expect a refusal however due to more fundamental issues. i.e. mDNS/DNS-SD is this unreliable, untrusted protocol that is used to spam the local network about the existance of a service. Security people tend to stay away from technology like that and normally don't see the usefulness of this.

Yes, i know, I am not selling this very well right now.... Let's hope I am mistaken.

Revision history for this message
In , Fedora (fedora-redhat-bugs) wrote :

This package has changed ownership in the Fedora Package Database. Reassigning to the new owner of this component.

Revision history for this message
In , Bug (bug-redhat-bugs) wrote :

This bug appears to have been reported against 'rawhide' during the Fedora 11 development cycle.
Changing version to '11'.

More information and reason for this action is here:
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/BugZappers/HouseKeeping

Revision history for this message
Mario Limonciello (superm1) wrote :

Here's a related bug in F11: https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=475996

Bug Watch Updater (bug-watch-updater)
Changed in openssh (Debian):
status: Unknown → New
Thierry Carrez (ttx)
Changed in openssh (Ubuntu):
importance: Undecided → Wishlist
status: New → Confirmed
Revision history for this message
In , Jan (jan-redhat-bugs) wrote :

This bug already has been fixed by static avahi registration.

Revision history for this message
In , Bastien (bastien-redhat-bugs) wrote :

Not sure what you mean by that, but key certainly isn't exported using openssh-5.2p1-28.fc12.x86_64:
$ avahi-browse -ar
= eth0 IPv4 cookie SSH Remote Terminal local
   hostname = [cookie.local]
   address = [192.168.1.140]
   port = [22]
   txt = []

Pedro Villavicencio (pedro)
Changed in openssh (Ubuntu):
status: Confirmed → Triaged
Revision history for this message
In , Jan (jan-redhat-bugs) wrote :

It is exactly the same as MacOS exported.

Revision history for this message
In , Bug (bug-redhat-bugs) wrote :

This message is a reminder that Fedora 11 is nearing its end of life.
Approximately 30 (thirty) days from now Fedora will stop maintaining
and issuing updates for Fedora 11. It is Fedora's policy to close all
bug reports from releases that are no longer maintained. At that time
this bug will be closed as WONTFIX if it remains open with a Fedora
'version' of '11'.

Package Maintainer: If you wish for this bug to remain open because you
plan to fix it in a currently maintained version, simply change the 'version'
to a later Fedora version prior to Fedora 11's end of life.

Bug Reporter: Thank you for reporting this issue and we are sorry that
we may not be able to fix it before Fedora 11 is end of life. If you
would still like to see this bug fixed and are able to reproduce it
against a later version of Fedora please change the 'version' of this
bug to the applicable version. If you are unable to change the version,
please add a comment here and someone will do it for you.

Although we aim to fix as many bugs as possible during every release's
lifetime, sometimes those efforts are overtaken by events. Often a
more recent Fedora release includes newer upstream software that fixes
bugs or makes them obsolete.

The process we are following is described here:
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/BugZappers/HouseKeeping

Revision history for this message
In , Jan (jan-redhat-bugs) wrote :

This may or may not be a part of the avahi code, but it can't be done in openssh. There are no means to provide it.

Revision history for this message
In , Bug (bug-redhat-bugs) wrote :

Fedora 11 changed to end-of-life (EOL) status on 2010-06-25. Fedora 11 is
no longer maintained, which means that it will not receive any further
security or bug fix updates. As a result we are closing this bug.

If you can reproduce this bug against a currently maintained version of
Fedora please feel free to reopen this bug against that version.

Thank you for reporting this bug and we are sorry it could not be fixed.

Revision history for this message
Bruno Nova (brunonova) wrote :

It would be really nice if openssh-server would publish via Avahi the SSH and SFTP services by default.
Examples of both services are provided in /usr/share/doc/avahi-daemon/examples/.

Publishing the SFTP service would be great because Nautilus (and other file managers, I suppose) lists, in it's Network "folder", all computers that are publishing that service, allowing to easily connect to those computers via SFTP and transfer files, much like Samba (no guest access, though).

Bug Watch Updater (bug-watch-updater)
Changed in openssh (Fedora):
importance: Unknown → Medium
status: Unknown → Won't Fix
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