During a website migration process server access may be required by both the parties. This guide will help you identify your situation and help you with the steps to gain or provide server access via SSH.
Step 1: Generate an SSH key-pair
An ssh key-pair must be generated before server access is provided to anyone.
ssh-keygen
This command will require you to enter the filename and password for the key-pair. Leave them empty to save it with default filenames and set no password.
The generated key-pair will contain two files :
- id_rsa - This is your private ssh key and must not be shared with anyone.
- id_rsa.pub - This is the public key that should be shared with external users to gain access to the server.
From here, you have two options to provide server access -
- Allow Reclaim Hosting to access your external private Server.
- Provide you access to the Server hosted with us at Reclaim Hosting.
Step 2a: Add our SSH key to your server
For every migration, we will provide an SSH key (generated using Step 1 above) that you will need to add to your server.
Navigate to the hidden .ssh directory in your default user's home.
cd ~/.ssh
This will have a file named authorized_keys which contains ssh keys of all authorized users to the server. Edit the file using any file editor like vim or nano and add our SSH key to the file.
vim authorized_keys
Save the file.
Finally, provide us the username with which we can access the server and copy over the files required for migration.
Step 2b: Provide your public ssh key to add to our server
Alternatively, If you are not comfortable with providing us access to your server, you can provide us your public key.
- Generate your ssh key-pair using Step 1 above.
- Share your public key securely with us via https://onetimesecret.com.
- We will add your ssh key to the authorized_keys file on our server and share the username with which you may access our server and transfer the files required for migration.