OK, this is the problem. I have 2 machines TestA ( Suse 9.0 ) TestB ( Mandrake 10 ) and one of our guys wants to scp from TestA to TestB without the password prompt appearing. Sounds simple so far....

Ok, I haven't used ssh-keygen before, so I create identical logins to test what I'm doing...



TestA ~user/.ssh > ssh-keygen -t dsa -f ./id_dsa ( Hit enter to set blank password )
TestA ~user/.ssh > scp id_dsa.pub user@TestA:~/.ssh ( use password )

TestB ~user/.ssh > cd ~user/.ssh
TestB ~user/.ssh > mv id_dsa.pub authorized_keys2
TestB ~user/.ssh > rm id_dsa.pub



It now works fine for the test logins, but when I try to apply this to the guy upstairs logins it still asks for the passwords....

I assume it must be down to some kind of difference in the logins but I can't really find any...

Any ideas ????

I would check the permissions on the users home directory and .ssh and the files under the .ssh directory for the user that is having the issue.

Make sure you look at both machines home directories as well.

All directories are the same, all permissions are the same....



Total confusions reigns...

Is there any other system/config files that could stop this from happening ??

Can you post the permissions of the .ssh directory and all the files within?

I shall humbly hold my head in shame.....

The problem was caused by the ~user/.ssh directory having 755 permissions instead off 700 on one of the boxes....

Obviously ssh protocol doesn't like the idea of having it's key files open for anyone other than the user....



Cheers for the help guys...