SSH, The Secure Shell: The Definitive Guide, 2nd Edition

Advanced Client Use

Most of the time, the Tectia GUI applications effectively act as configuration editors, allowing users and administrators to change and save the configuration without worrying about the location or format of configuration files. In some other circumstances, however, an understanding of these details is useful, so we’ll provide a brief guided tour through the internal structure of Tectia’s configuration on Windows.

The system client configuration file ssh2_config is stored in the Tectia client installation folder. This file has the same format and function as the /etc/ssh2/ssh2_config file on Unix systems.[7.1.2.2]

Most other parts of the configuration are separately maintained for each user, and are stored in the user profile folder^[173] in the application data subfolder.^[174] Tectia configuration files are collected in a subfolder named SSH. This folder is analogous to the user configuration folder on Unix systems (typically ~/.ssh2, but ultimately determined by the UserConfigDirectory keyword), although the specific files and folder layout are different for Windows, as we’ll see. [5.3.1.5]

Warning

If roaming profiles are used, then the user profile folder is replicated on a server, and files are transmitted to client machines via the network, where they can be seen by anyone who is able to sniff traffic en route. To prevent this, either disable roaming profiles for Tectia users, or store the Tectia configuration files in a different, local folder. If the SSHCLIENT_USERPROFILE ...