SSH and the Ubuntu Server

[Luke Faraone]

On 11/18/2010 12:04 PM, Dustin Kirkland wrote:
> On Thu, Nov 18, 2010 at 9:30 AM, Colin Watson <cjwatson at ubuntu.com> wrote:
>> No, it's not.  In Maverick it was arguably buried.  In Natty, it is the
>> very top entry on the tasksel menu, and the cursor rests on it when you
>> reach that screen.
> [snip]
>
> I would gladly revise this proposal to simply:
>  * Automatically 'tick' OpenSSH Server by default on the Server Tasksel screen
> 
> Which would also sit there and wait for the user to consciously affirm
> their selection, and would avoid the countless server installations
> where people forget to install SSH and must make their way back to a
> console on their newly installed system and add the openssh-server
> package.

As many people have mentioned, this will cause a surprise for users who
click through the install dialogs expecting things to not change since
they last used it.

Also, since this occurs late in the install process, no dialogs to
prompt the user to harden their password can be offered, as others have
suggested.

You say there are "countless" installations. I don't think anybody
expects SSH to be automatically installed in a new server; it's a
service that should be enabled carefully after consideration of your
network environment and security needs. I feel that the potential for
harm of accidental installation exceeds the increase in convenience from
not having to explicitly select the task.

-- 
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│Luke Faraone                          ╭Debian / Ubuntu Developer╮│
│http://luke.faraone.cc                ╰Sugar Labs, Systems Admin╯│
│PGP: 5189 2A7D 16D0 49BB 046B  DC77 9732 5DD8 F9FD D506          │
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