Slow SSH and FTP

[Nickolas A Gray]

Login's to both FTP and SSH Are taking way to long to connect.

The first SSH takes 80 seconds on the average.
After that it takes about 5-10 seconds.

The FTP Session is taking 2.5 minutes on the average. While waiting, I get the message "Socket connected. Waiting for welcome message"

It is most likely not networking issues because I get the same performance from a machine accross a T that I get on the lan segment.

I also understand that the FTPD is running as part of inetd. I think that if I can find a way to run the daemon all the time, this will make the initial connection to FTP faster, but what about SSH? It is running as a daemon now.

These machines have almost no load level to speak of.

Thanks

[Patrick Wallek]

It sounds like you have some issues with resolving the hostname of the machine you are connecting to. Are you using DNS? If so, do a 'nslookup machine_name' and a 'nslookup ip_address' of the machine you are trying to connect to. If this takes a while then this is your problem. Also check the /etc/nsswitch.conf to see what order it is trying to look hosts up in. Also check your /etc/resolv.conf to make sure you are using good DNS servers.

I seriously doubt that not having ftpd running all the time is part of your problem. I think if you can solve what is probably a hostname lookup issue, then you will solve your problem.

[Nickolas A Gray]

I should have indicated this earlier, but I knew I would forget something. I am actually using just the IP address.

[James A. Donovan]

A few things to take a look at...

1. Use lanadmin to check and see if you're getting a lot of errors. Especially any that are logged in the "Ethernet-like Statistics group"

2. Check the output of dmesg and your /var/adm/syslog/syslog.log file for error messages.

3. If you have stm, mstm or cstm; see if you can get anything from the utilities provided in there.

4. Swap out the network cable connecting the server.

5. Check the duplex settings on both your server's network card and the port of whatever hub/switch it may be plugged into. If the settings don't match, that could be the source of your problem.

6. If you have a crossover cable, try directly connecting a laptop to your server. Then use SSH or FTP to login. If it still takes a long time, then you know the problem is with your server.

7. Swap out the server's network card for a new one, if all else is failing.

hope this list is of some help....

Jim

[Jerry U · Accepted solution]

your problem sounds exactly like a failure to reverse lookup the ip address you are coming from. (it doesn't matter if you are using the ip address to get to the machine, since the machines is trying to look YOUR ip up for logging and security reasons.

try a who -u once you are logged in.
if you see ip numbers and not names you are having dns issues. put your ip in /etc/hosts.
(there is also a way to stop this behavior but I forget how. IT has to do with tcp wrappers usually)

J