Linux Experts: Telnet Server Configuration

Telnet Server

Telnet is a network protocol used on the Internet or local area networks to provide a bidirectional interactive text-oriented communications facility using a virtual terminal connection. It also works in the distributed environment. Telnet uses theport number 23. Here i am going to install and configure telnet server on Red Hat Enterprise linux 6 server. This procedure is also applicable to fedora distribution. Before installing the telnet server check out the minimum requirements of the system.

Minimum Requirements :

1. Yum Configuration

2. IP Configuration ( My Server ip address is 192.10.10.1 )

Telnet Server Configuration

1. Open Terminal and login as root user.

2. Install Telnet server using yum. If your system does not configure with yum click here.

#yum install telnet telnet-server

3. Press ‘y‘ to proceed the installation.

4. Now configure telnet server, change the directory to /etc/xinetd.d

# cd /etc/xinetd.d

5. Edit the telnet file using vi editor.

6. Change ’disable = yes‘ to ‘disable = no‘.( Change the executable mode to insert mode by pressing ‘i’ ). Save and quit the file ( Esc + : + wq ).

7. Restart the xinetd service and make those changes as permanent by using chkconfig.

# service xinetd restart – The service is enabled temporarily upto the system gets reboot.

# chkconfig xinetd on – The service is enabled permanently.

8. If you still struggling to configure, check out the firewall settings

# setup

9. Enable the firewall settings and add telnet port number : 23 and Protocol is tcp

10. Again restart the xinetd and telnet services once.

# service xinetd restart

#service telnet restart

Telnet Client Configuration

In the Client system , Open the terminal to access the remote system before that you should know the ip address of the remote server. Telnet provides insecure communicationbetween server and client. For the secure communication use ssh. Configuration of ssh is also explained in an another article.

1. Open Terminal and use the command telnet <server ip address >

2. You should know your username and password to access the remote system. (My login name : sai )