I want to start a command(cmd file) on remote windows 7/2008 hosts via rdp connection.
If it possible I want to operate from linux and python. If not - I can use windows.
So I have access to windows machines only via rdp. I have to start commands in automatically mode. What is the easiest way?
Don't.
Use WinRS, which is the proper solution for remote execution on Windows. See Using WinRS.
There are hacks to allow RDP to execute something remotely (eg. Can RDP clients launch remote applications and not desktops), they are hacks. RDP does not have remote execution facilities.
If you want a Linux client, then install an SSH server on your Windows images. If you're brave you could give OpenWSMAN a shot, but frankly I'd stick to ssh.
Related
I need to run a script on a large number of windows VMs. psremoting or WMI remoting would be ideal for this, but those connections are blocked by the firewall. However the firewall does enable RDP connections.
It would be possible to remote desktop to each VM individually and run the script, but I want to automate this. Is there anyway to do so through RDP?
I'm not sure If this helps you, But if you are using Hyper-V and you have admin access to Hyper-V host, you could try PowerShell Direct :
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/virtualization/hyper-v/manage/manage-windows-virtual-machines-with-powershell-direct
Our team has ~80 Windows development machines, and activities of each developer are logged as text files on the local storage of those machines.
To analyze the logged activities, I want to gather all log files from those machines. Additionally, the log files are updated constantly, so It is desirable to gather files with the command-line from my machine.
I’ve searched and found some solutions, but all of those are not suitable for our situation:
We cannot use PsExec, because tcp/135 and tcp/445 are both closed (countermeasure for WannaCry).
Administrative share is disabled.
telnet service is not up and is banned by security reasons.
WinRM is disabled on those machines by default.
It is difficult to install new software like OpenSSH on those machines (because of the rule of this project)
RDP is the only way to connect those machines. (I have an account on all machines)
How can I copy files from remote Windows machines with command-line through RDP?
Or, at least, is there any way to execute a command on remote Windows machines with command-line through RDP?
I think you can do this, though it is very hacky :)
For a basic setup, which just copies files once, what you would need to do is
Run a script in the remote session when it logs in. I can think of three ways to do this:
Use the "Alternate Shell" RDP file property. This runs a specified program in place of explorer.exe on login; you can use it to run "cmd.exe /c [your script]" for instance.
If that doesn't work (e.g. the remote machine doesn't respect it), you might be able to use a scheduled task that runs the script on login, but perhaps only for a specified user, or maybe the script could check the WinStation type to make sure this is actually an RDP connection before doing anything.
It's also possible to do this by connecting in RemoteApp mode and using the script as your "application", but that only works for Server and Enterprise editions of Windows.
Enable either drive redirection or clipboard redirection on the RDP connection, to give you a way to get data out.
Drive redirection is much simpler to script; you just have the remote script copy files to e.g. "\\tsclient\C\logs".
Clipboard redirection is theoretically possible - you have the remote script copy, then a local script paste - but would probably be a pain to get working in practice. I'm only mentioning it in case drive redirection isn't available for some reason.
You would probably want to script to then log the session off afterward.
You could then launch that from command-line by running "mstsc.exe [your RDP file]". The RDP files could be programmatically generated if needed (given you're working with 80 machines).
If you want a persistent connection you can execute commands over, that's more complicated, but still technically possible. Two ways I can think of:
Use the previous method to run a program on logon, but this time create a custom application that receives commands using a transport that isn't blocked and executes them in the session. I've done this with WCF over HTTP, for instance; it's not secure, of course.
Develop and install a service on the remote machine that opens an RDP virtual channel, and a corresponding RDP client plugin that communicates with it. You can then do whatever you want across the connection. While this solution would be the most likely to work, it's also the most heavyweight and time-consuming to implement so it's probably a last resort.
I'm trying to execute a .bat file on a windows box remotely from a Linux box by connecting via ssh, obtaining windows command prompt and then executing the batch file.
When I connect to the windows machine I can see that the process is running but the graphical interface is not being invoked.
Regards
Rahul
Probably, you need to install x server on windows? Consider for xming as one option. I am assuming that you have installed ssh-server on windows system.
NOTE: You need to login on the windows box (once, after windows login), start the x server on windows & then onwards you should be able to ssh to the system & start the GUI application.
Another possible issue:
The ssh-server binary should be executed by the user, after logging in once after the windows system boot. Then ssh to that windows box, export DISPLAY=:0 & run GUI app.
NOTE: I have not tested any of the above 2 solution, but these are what I think as possible solutions.
One more solution:
Create a dedicated TCP based server (on windows) client (on linux) model & send commands over that channel. A dirty way & would be able to give limited functionality, but it is tested to be working.
is it possible to execute a command (ex: launching a .bat file located on the remote machine) on a Windows Remote Machine, using a UNIX or Linux Machine ?
Is there something like a scp/ssh mechanism or at least a way to connect to a Windows Machine passing through the network ?
Thanks for your help.
By default, recent Windows versions only support the Remote Desktop protocol. As far as I know, client versions only allow a single user, while server versions with installed Terminal Services allow for multiple simultaneous users.
Windows Server versions also support the Telnet protocol, but the server is disabled by default - it may not even be installed. Therefore you will have to enable it manually. Do you really want to use Telnet of all things, though? Just the security concerns are enough to make it mostly useless.
There is also a version of OpenSSH for Windows, that uses the Cygwin DLL. I have not tried it, but using an SSH implementation from the Unix world does have its appeal (and probably a few disadvantages). See also this.
EDIT:
Recent Windows versions also support the Windows Remote Management system, which allows you to launch an interactive session throuh a bit of trickery.
You may want to try Vandyke VShell.
I am developing some Python programs that I'm running on a remote Ubuntu Linux server (hosted on Slicehost). I would like to work on the source in an IDE on my Windows Vista PC, and have all file modifications sent directly to the Linux box without my intervention (i.e. without having to manually SFTP the files each time I change them). What is the very easiest way I can do this?
WinSCP includes a basic remote file editor, though if you want to use a proper IDE for your development this won't be much help.
I'd suggest you run a version control system like subversion, which would allow you to write a post-commit hook to automatically rsync your code the server with each commit.
Use PuTTy and SFTPDrive.
PuTTy is an SSH client, and SFTPDrive ($39 USD) will allow you to mount your remote file system locally as a drive letter.
Install Samba and OpenVPN on the server, and OpenVPN on the client. Setup Samba to share the directory tree you're interested in, and access it over the VPN for security. Perhaps Vista has non-sucky WebDAV support by now, and you could use WebDAV over HTTPS, but it was always crap under XP.
Ben's suggestion of a local dev environment using a VM is also a winner.
You could install cygwin and then have rsync run on cron every minute.
Or you could use Netdrive to access the server via FTP like a local disk:
http://tech.xptechsupport.com/netdrive-turn-your-ftp-into-a-drive-letter.html
Or you may be able to achieve something similar using cygwin and FUSE - you can on linux, but never tried it on cygwin.
Also, would it not be easier to set up a full dev environment locally? Maybe using a virtual machine? It'll be much quicker for testing. And then you can set up a shell script to transfer the current version to the slicehost server.