newbie telnet question

[L_S]

Okay this is literally my second day using Linux so I dont feel too dumb asking this question. Anywho, I'm running Mandrake 7.2 and having trouble telnetting into my comp. I did a search for "telnet" on these boards and read a billion posts but still cant figure out my problem.

As I have read a billion posts here about telnet, I know the first person to respond to this post will probably tell me I should go use SSH instead (whatever that is). Thats all well and good and I'll look into that sooner or later, but like I said I'm just starting out and want to figure this out first.

So here's the story:
*running mandrake 7.2
* the telnet line in my /etc/inetd.conf is already "uncommented"
* my /etc/hosts.deny is blank
*have a dsl line
*here's where it gets hairy, I have a Linksys broandband router which dynamically assiagns ips to all the comps on my network and has a built in firewall

So where do I go from here hehe? http://www.linuxnewbie.org/ubb/smile.gif

Remember its only my second day, dont hurt me http://www.linuxnewbie.org/ubb/biggrin.gif

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Do not judge a man until you have walked a mile in his shoes, then you will be a mile away from him and have his shoes.

[This message has been edited by L_S (edited 06 November 2000).]

[Evil Jeff]

The program that opens your machine to accept telnet connections is called telnetd (telnet daemon, I think). If you uncommented the parts related to it in your file, try restarting the program inetd ("/etc/inetd restart" in mandrake i think) or rebooting. Also, you may need to edit your hosts file (/etc/hosts) to know where your computer is if you don't want to telnet into a ip.

SSH is a more secure interface. I'm pretty sure it works similarly, but I don't really use it since I'm behind a HUGE firewall don't really have to worry about what I do behind it.

Hope that helps. Best regards,

Evil Jeff
www.hellincorporated.com (http://www.hellincorporated.com)

[ph34r]

You are right.

Use ssh - telnet is terribly insecure.

Anyway, can you telnet to the machine from itself? You should be able to. If not, then telnet is not setup properly.

I think that if telnet is setup and working (see above test) that I would start looking for some documentation on that router to see what kind of firewall it is using, and if/how it is configureable - it may be blocking access, if you are going thru it to access one machine from another.

Once you have telnet working, get and install ssh - the process will be basically the same, and ssh is much more secure http://www.linuxnewbie.org/ubb/smile.gif

[L_S]

Thanks guys http://www.linuxnewbie.org/ubb/smile.gif...hey what if the computer I am at doesnt have ssh installed on it, can I still get into the mahcine running ssh using telnet? Cuz isnt just about every computer out there gonna have some sort of telnet client, but all might not have ssh? If I'm a complete idiot, please say so.