Cannot connect to Compute Engine instance via SSH

google-compute-engine gcloud
Nam G VU picture Nam G VU · Sep 11, 2014 · Viewed 17.9k times · Source

I've just created an instance using Google Cloud Platform's Compute Engine and tried to connect to it via SSH connection but it failed.

I'm following the quick start here.

I have generated the SSH key on my PC and have entered the pass-phrase when asked. Though I fail to succeed a log in :-(

I got the PuTTY SSH's error as below snapshots.

enter image description here

Then I get the PuTTY window inactive.

enter image description here

Answer

scampsi picture scampsi · Sep 11, 2014

I have the same problem but found a workaround to connect via PuTTY manually.

In brief

  1. Generate SSH key for the machine instance
  2. Add SSH public key to the instance
  3. Prepare to log in - acquiring information for IP, login name, pass phrase, private SSH key
  4. Connect to the instance via SSH client, e.g. PuTTY in Windows

Detail steps

For me the gcloud quick start had already:

  • launched my instance
  • created my public and private RSA keys (in C:\Users\USER_NAME\.ssh\)

Public Key - C:\Users\USER_NAME\.ssh\google_compute_engine.pub

Private Key - C:\Users\USER_NAME\.ssh\google_compute_engine.ppk

enter image description here

  1. Go to the Google Developers Console in your browser
  2. Select your project and in the left hand nav bar click: Compute -> Compute Engine -> VM instances
  3. Your running instance(s) will be linked below the CPU usage chart
  4. Click the one you want and find the Add SSH key link and click it
  5. Paste the entire contents of google_compute_engine.pub into the field that appears
  6. Click Save and after a few seconds the key details will appear on the page (if you get an error you pasted from the wrong key file or didn't copy all the text)
  7. The first word in those details is your (case sensitive) username

enter image description here

  1. Find the External IP above on the page

  2. Open PuTTY and paste the external IP into Host Name (port is the default of 22)

  3. In the left hand nav expand: Connection -> SSH and then click Auth

  4. Next to "Private key file for authentication" click "Browse"
  5. Select "C:\Users\USER_NAME\.ssh\google_compute_engine.ppk" and click Open
  6. Scroll the left hand nav back up and click the top item "Session"
  7. Under "Saved Sessions" enter a name and click "Save"
  8. Accept the warning message and you should be prompted to login with the username from above step
  9. Input your passphrase
  10. Done

Hope this helps. If someone has a solution for the gcloud issue I'd love to hear it too.

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