Adding a public key to a remote site for SSH

Adding my public key to a server is something I have to do often enough that I want it to be easier, but rarely enough that I can never remember how to do it.

The simple way to do it is to issue this command from your local terminal (note—this is all one line even though it may be broken up into multiple lines in this blog entry)

ssh-copy-id -i ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub username@remote.server.com

This assumes you already have a working public/private key pair that you are using, and the id_rsa.pub is the public key you are sharing.

You will be asked for the password on the remote server (and your passphrase for your private key, if you are smart enough to use one of those), and if everything is in order you will be able to ssh into the remote server using your public/private key pair instead of supplying a password.

Frustrating Python Class Objects

Generally I am a big fan of Python, but today it drove me a little nuts. The solution was hard to find, but simple to implement. And the problem was probably caused by my "Java-thinking," which Pythonic folks will tsk-tsk you for.

What's great about Python is that you can easily distill your problem down to simple parts and test them directly in a script or with the interpreter. So I was able to boil down my problem to the following:

Ubuntu without password requests

When I bought a computer for my son a few years ago, it came with XP preloaded. It was a refurbished computer from a local store, and they do a good job of putting together a cheap, basic system. At the time, I contemplated wiping the disk and putting Linux on it instead, but since it was already working and ready to use I decided to leave it as-is. The guys at the store had put Firefox and OpenOffice on it, so why mess with it?

Transcoding MP3 files for Nintendo DSi

My son's Nintendo DSi is a very cool little toy, but could they have made it harder to put music on it? After copying his MP3 files over to an SD card and putting it in, I thought I was done. But clearly Nintendo has other ideas.