Advertising SSH over mDNS (Rendezvous) with Avahi
A couple months ago, I posted some instructions for configuring a Linux system to run the Apple Filing Protocol (AFP) so that it could work as a network file-server for Macs. The AFP shares are advertised using a protocol called mDNS, or, as Apple has branded it, Rendezvous. mDNS is a great way for computers and appliances on a network to notify each other about the services they offer. This can greatly simplify access to these services. Note that it doesn't necessarily make those services any less secure; they're just explicitly advertised. Security of services should not depend on them being hidden.
So, I wanted to configure my Linux machine to also advertise the Secure Shell (SSH) it runs. This way it will show up in the Mac OS X Terminal application automatically as one of the available hosts to connect to. This is shown in the image below:
If you've already got Avahi running on your Linux machine, then advertising this additional service will be simple. As the root user, changes directories to /etc/avahi/services and create a file called ssh.service. Paste the following text into the new ssh.service file:
<service-group> <name replace-wildcards="yes">SSH on %h</name> <service> <type>_ssh._tcp</type> <port>22</port> </service> </service-group>Finally, restart the Avahi service with /etc/init.d/avahi-daemon restart.