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After disabling sshd, I'm having issues re-enabling/starting it via systemctl.

I'm sure I've hosed something, but this is what I did:

  • ~fresh xubuntu 16.04.2 install
  • apt install openssh-server
    • probably had to manually enabled it; I don't remember
    • kept default config file as-is (accessing over local LAN only)
  • (ssh'd in successfully to scp over data from a previous machine)
  • attempted to disable sshd, as I didn't intend to use it further
    • systemctl stop sshd && systemctl disable sshd && systemctl mask sshd
    • (did I do something wrong here?)
  • now I need ssh access again, so I am trying to enable:
    • systemctl unmask sshd - outputs that it removed the /dev/null symlink
    • systemctl enable sshd Failed to execute operation: No such file or directory

Searching for solutions, I didn't find much besides what (I think) I already tried. I have re-installed apt remove openssh-server && apt install openssh-server, but I am getting the same result.

An systemctl status sshd shows:

sshd.service
 Loaded: not-found (Reason: No such file or directory)
 Active: inactive (dead)

I'm not familiar with systemctl. Help would be greatly appreciated!!

Greenonline
  • 2,390
some bits flipped
  • 151

2 Answers2

2

It appears that sshd is an "alias" of sorts for ssh.service; when you install openssh-server, symlink(s) are set up mapping this.

However, when you systemctl disable sshd those symlinks are deleted, and are NOT restored with an enable.

The solutions is to systemctl enable ssh.service

some bits flipped
  • 151
1

I stumbled over this question with the same trace:

$ sudo systemctl start sshd.service
Failed to start sshd.service: Unit sshd.service is masked.

As suggested, systemctl enable ssh.service did not work.

It turned out that I had removed openssh-service.

dpkg -l openssh-server

I needed to install it again:

sudo apt install openssh-server

And the service is back:

$ systemctl status sshd
● ssh.service - OpenBSD Secure Shell server
     Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/ssh.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
     Active: active (running) since Wed 2021-09-15 13:30:50 CEST; 1min 14s ago
       Docs: man:sshd(8)
             man:sshd_config(5)
   Main PID: 1266628 (sshd)
      Tasks: 1 (limit: 18525)
     Memory: 1.5M
     CGroup: /system.slice/ssh.service
             └─1266628 sshd: /usr/sbin/sshd -D [listener] 0 of 10-100 startups
larsl
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