Configure SSH Server on Windows Server 2025
Enabling SSH on Windows Server has historically required third-party tools or complex configuration. Windows Server 2025 streamlines the process, making it easier than ever to set up secure remote command-line access. In this post I'll walk you through enabling and configuring the built-in SSH server, adjusting firewall rules, and managing user access. Enable the Built-in SSH Server Open Server Manager on your Windows Server 2025 machine. Select the Local Server node from the left-hand menu. Look for the new entry labeled Remote SSH Access. Click on the blue text (which says "Disabled" by default) next to Remote SSH Access. A script will run to enable the SSH server. When prompted, type yes to allow the script to execute and complete the setup. The script will also display important information about firewall settings and which user accounts can connect via SSH. Configure Windows Firewall for SSH Open Windows Defender Firewall with Advanced Security. Go to Inbound Rules. Find the rule named OpenSSH SSH Server. Right-click and choose Properties. On the Advanced tab, ensure that the rule is enabled for both Domain and Private profiles. By default, the rule is only enabled for networks tagged as private, which is typical for domain-joined servers Grant User Access to SSH When the SSH server is enabled, a local group called OpenSSH Users is created. Open Computer Management and navigate to Local Users and Groups > Groups. Double-click the OpenSSH Users group. Add the user accounts you want to allow SSH access. You can add individual users or, for easier management across multiple servers, add a domain group to the local OpenSSH Users group. Connect Using an SSH Client From another computer, you need an SSH client. On Windows, you can use the built-in client or install the Microsoft OpenSSH client via the Windows Package Manager (winget). To initiate a connection, use the following syntax in a terminal or PowerShell window: ssh DOMAIN\username@server_name Replace DOMAIN with your domain name, username with your user account, and server_name with the name of the Windows Server you enabled SSH on. The first time you connect, you'll see a prompt about the server's key fingerprint. Type yes to continue. Enter your password when prompted. You should now have a remote SSH session into your Windows Server 2025 machine. You can further configure the SSH server, such as specifying which shell is used or enabling key-based authentication. For more advanced configuration, consult the following docs article on Learn: OpenSSH Server configuration for Windows Server and Windows
Optimal Deployment of PHP- / NodeJS-Websites with Azure
Hi everyone, I'm PHP-Developer and pretty new to Azure Devops. At the moment I am struggeling a bit by creating an optimal CI-process with Azure Devops. Im working locally with Docker(DDEV) and want to deploy my php-application including my NodeJS-Frontend to my customers webspaces. I have got SSH-Access to these Servers, can get PHP, Node, Composer etc. but I am just thinking that building my whole website on a production-Server during my deployment seems not to be a good solution. Does anybody have experience with this kind of deployment with Azure Devops? My current workflow is: Build Pipeline: 1. Build ubuntu Image 2. Install php in image 3. Composer install in image 4. Node install 5. Npm install 6. Start frontend build 7. Copy files to build artefact (frontend builts including composer.lock for php without vendor folder) 8. Publish build artifact Release Pipeline: 1. Download artefact 2. Copy files from artefact to target host via SSH 3. Composer install on target system 4. Deleting Caches 5. Finalize Job It feels not really optimal and my tests are still not included. But any help is more than welcome. Im really interested in finding a better way. If somebody either knows good documentation, screencast or direct community access, let me know. 🙂 Greetz from Cologne - Germany Sven
Windows user is limited to start/stop windows service only when logged in from SSH client.
Hi, I have configured non-admin user in Windows 2019 Server to be able to start/stop windows service. The user successfully does this by logging directly but unable to do so through Open SSH client. Installed - OpenSSH.Server~~~~0.0.1.0 net stop/start service gives this error in SSH client: System error 5 has occurred. Access is denied. As I said this happens only if the user logs on through SSH client. Any idea why this happens and is there anything to be done in OpenSSH configuration to fix this issue? Thanks!
Installing openssh client and server optional feature fails on Windows Server 2019 1809
Hello Experts, When I try to install the SSH Server and Client optional features in Windows Server 2019 it fails. They do not install. In the settings -> Manage Optional Features menu, it looks like they start but never complete and then show up back in the list of available features. This is only happening on one server. We have tried to reboot, and it did not fix the issue. SFC /scannow did not help, neither did the dism /cleanup-image /scanhealth command. Also tried installing using powershell with no luck. The powershell command add-windowsCapability -online -name OpenSSH.Server~~~0.0.1.0 appears to finish but then when we run get-WindowsCapability -online | where-object name -like 'OpenSSH*', the resultant State is "Not Present" for both client and server. Any ideas what may be wrong?ssh from hyper-v host to linux guest not working. Works perfectly from other machines. How to fix?
I have a linux guest with ssh enabled on a hyper-v host. Depending on the assigned vSwitch (Default or External), I can ssh into linux from hyper-v host but not from other systems, or I cannot ssh into linux from hyper-v host but I can from other systems. In both cases, linux can access the internet. host's IP address is 192.168.1.204. Other test machine's IP address is 192.168.1.7. Case 1: Linux on Default vSwitch, assigned address 172.23.174.5 ping from host to linux - works ssh from host to linux - works (as the network 172.23.160/20 is directly connected to host by the Hyper-V setup) ping from test to linux - will not work, since it is on another subnet ssh from test to linux - will not work, since it is on another subnet ping from linux to 8.8.8.8 - works Case 2: Linux on External vSwitch, assigned address 192.168.1.214 ping from host to linux - works!! ssh from host to linux - "Connection refused" <<<--- this is the culprit ping from test to linux - works ssh from test to linux - works ping from linux to 8.8.8.8 - works Obviously, I could go with Case 1 (NAT) and use port forwarding (netsh interface portproxy..) on the host. But I'd rather like to understand why Case 2 does not work. Especially why ping from host to linux works, but ssh does not. Any idea why this does not work and how to fix this? Dan
