Optional
Action:  Telnet to LRP

After you get your LRP working, you may want to run LRP without a monitor and keyboard attached.
If you remove the keyboard, you may have to set the BIOS on your motherboard to
"ignore the absence of keyboard" so that it will boot up without keyboard attached.
Some old BIOS will not allow you to do that.

For secure remote control of LRP boxes, use SSH and SSHD to securely and remotely login
to the LRP boxes. Due to the size of  the sshd and ssh programs, the packages will not fit
on a floppy and you need to upgrade the LRP to use a Compact Flash or hard disk. See this page.

However, if all you need is telnet to LRP from inside your network, you can do the following: 

  Use of telnet protocol is considered unsafe due to the plain-text password and
un-encrypted traffic stream. Use telnet at your own risks.

If you assemble a LRP using materials from other sites (particularly from those LRP
implementations without using Seawall), the following modification may render your LRP
vulnerable to easy attacks from outside.

On a LRP box with Seawall protection, drop to a command prompt #

ae   /etc/hosts.allow
add a line:
ALL:  ALL
leave a blank line before <<EOF>> marker
ctrl-S  and Enter
ctrl-C

then

ae  /etc/securetty
add to the list:
ttyp0
ttyp1
leave a blank line before <<EOF>> marker
ctrl-S  and Enter
ctrl-C

then (optional)

create a password for root:

passwd

then

lrcfg
choose Backup
choose etc

Putty http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/ has a free telnet/ssh client for Windows.

  For your safety, the default Seawall firewall rules, included in the packages on this Site,
when installed and used properly, should block all telnet access outside of your network.
That means the above modification allows you to telnet to the LRP from inside your network, but nobody,
including you, can telnet from the outside. This is a desirable situation.

Disclaimer

Thanks to Dave Parkinson of New Glasgow, Nova Scotia and Dean Ireland of Calgary, Alberta,
both from Canada, for their suggestions and tips on telnet to LRP.

Click here to return to the main LRP page

 
Last revised: Aug 10, 2006