How to Use SSH to Transfer File on iPhone

by Simon Ng on May 17, 2009



OpenSSH for iPhoneIf you ask me the top reason for jailbreaking iPhone, the ability to use SSH to transfer files between iPhone and computer via WiFi is my answer. I believe it’s also one of the reasons why some of you go for the jailbreak. But, as I know, not all the readers are geeks and come from technical background. You may even not heard of SSH until you decide to jailbreak. So, here is a short guide to show you how you can use SSH on iPhone and use it for transfer any files to your computer (Mac / Windows). The guide is completely target for non-technical person. I just want to show you how great SSH is when pairing with iPhone for wireless file transfer. So, you can use it to transfer ringtone and photos without the USB cable.

So, what’s SSH?

The first thing you would like to know is what SSH is. SSH stands for secure shell that is commonly used in Unix/Linux environment. You can use SSH to access a remote a computer and execute commands from another machine that may be miles away. Additionally, you can use it to transfer files to the remote computer, just like FTP. I’m not going to dig deep and throw out all the technical details about SSH. But just remember, SSH is a tool that lets you access machine or devices remotely. Here, the device is your iPhone.

Installing SSH on iPhone

You may be curious why you can use SSH on iPhone. Is SSH just designed for Unix? That’s a good question. You may not know the iPhone OS is a stripped-down version of Mac OS X, which is actually riding on Unix as its core. So, that’s why you can use SSH on iPhone.

But officially, Apple didn’t bundle the utility for every iPhone user and thanks to the jailbreak community to bring SSH to iPhone. As long as your iPhone is jailbroken, you can install and use SSH on iPhone.

To use SSH after jailbreak, you can go up to Cydia and search for “OpenSSH” to find the package. Tap the Install button to install it on your iPhone. Once installed, restart your iPhone. You’ll not find an icon for SSH on the home screen. But after restart, the SSH tool will be automatically launched and listens for remote request in background.

OpenSSH in Cydia

Note: Did you set the auto-lock? Your iPhone should be turned on during the SSH file transfer. So, if you have configured auto-lock, I suggest you to disable it before using SSH. You can go to Settings -> General -> Auto-Lock and set it to Never.

How to Transfer File Using SSH

Okay, here comes to the core part of this guide. How can you transfer file to & from iPhone remotely with WiFi? Now, your iPhone is already enabled with SSH and listens for incoming SSH request. Before you can transfer file from your computer to iPhone, you have to know the IP address of your iPhone.

To check for the IP address, go to “Settings” -> “Wi-Fi”. Tap on the connected WiFi network and view the details. You’ll see the IP address of your iPhone. Say, for my case, the IP address is 10.0.1.5.

iPhone WiFi IP Address

Once you know the IP address, the next step is to connect to iPhone from your PC or Mac.

For Windows User
For Windows users, I highly recommend you to download WinSCP, which is a free SSH client for Win XP/Vista. You can download it for free from here.

Installation of WinSCP is very straightforward. Just double-click on “winscp421setup.exe” and follow the instruction to install it on your PC.

Once complete the installation, launch WinSCP and click “New” to connect to iPhone. In host name, type in the IP address of your iPhone. For user name and password, you can use “root” and “alpine” respectively. Keep other fields unchanged. You can then click “Login” to start making connection with your iPhone. Click “Yes” if you’re prompted with a warning to add the host key to cache.

Tip: Instead of clicking “Login” directly, you can click “Save…” to save the connection profile for future use

WinSCP - New Connection

WinSCP - SSH Prompt

When connected, you’ll see the files in iPhone file system. And, you can easily transfer files between iPhone and computer by just drag & drop the files in WinSCP.

WinSCP - Connected with iPhone

For Mac User
Mac is SSH-friendly. There is already a SSH client bundled inside Mac OS X. But you can only use it in command mode only as it does not offer a graphical interface. So, I highly recommend you to download a free SSH client called “Cyberduck” to connect to iPhone. You can download Cyberduck via this direct link or via its homepage.

To transfer files to iPhone, simply launch Cyberduck and click “Open Connection”. Then fill in your iPhone’s IP address in “Server” field. And use “root” and “alpine” for user and password respectively.

Cyberduck - Open Connection

Next, click “Connect” button to connect to iPhone. And, Cyberduck will start establishing connection with your iPhone.

Make sure your iPhone is turned on. Otherwise, your Mac will fail to make the connection.

Once connected, you’ll see the folder list of your iPhone file system. You’re free to navigate through the file system. To download file from iPhone, just right-click on any file you want to download and select “Download To..” to retrieve the file. And, to transfer file back to iPhone, simply go to the destination folder and right-click to select “Upload”. That’s it!

Cyberduck - iPhone Connected

Further Information

I hope this guide is helpful for you and you can find SSH useful for iPhone. Now, to further enjoy the benefit of SSH, you can check out the following guides:

Do you find any problem with SSH? Feel free to leave comment and share your experience.

WARNING: It’s highly recommended you follow this guide to secure your jailbroken iPhone (with SSH enabled) from virus attack!

 Share with Your Friends

What's Next?

If you find the post is useful, subscribe to Simon Blog using RSS or Email to get free iPhone updates. Alternatively, you can follow me on Twitter or join us on Facebook.

Related Post you'll like:

Sign up and Download Free iPhone Guide

{ 111 comments… read them below or add one }

1 Javier Gil May 18, 2009 at 4:17 am

hi…… and how do you change permissions for the files??? (ex. 777etc..)

Reply

2 Dusty May 18, 2009 at 9:56 pm

@Javier Gil
Yo! Right click on the file, scroll down to properties/CHMOD. Once clicked, a new window will open up and u will see permissions [xxxx] Change the permissions to correct number and hit apply or ok.

Good job on the How To Simon!

Reply

3 Nam Luu May 19, 2009 at 6:15 am

Hey Simon, thanks for the great how-to. However, I think it’s still too difficult for most ppl. I tried SSh my iphone once when I first jailbreak it but I got tired of the tedious process.
There’s a simple solution to this. I dont know if you ever heard of “iphonebrowser.” It’s a great opensource app that lets you access your iphone sans all the setups that are required for SSH.

Pros:
Plug, Run and Play. No more preliminary steps.
Fast transfer speed (over USB cable)
Easy for everyone, no need to write a guide for it.
Preset Directories: Wallpapers, Pictures, DCIM photo, UI Sounds, Ringtones, Theme folder etc.

Cons:
No wireless transfer (must use USB cable)
changing permission? (I never change permission so I dont know if it’s there or not)

Let me know if you find Iphonebrowser worthy.

Reply

4 Nam Luu May 19, 2009 at 6:18 am

I forgot one best Pro:
you get to access/transfer files in the background even when the phone is locked. How cool is that.

Reply

5 sam June 26, 2009 at 10:32 am

Hi Simon,

After upgrade, jail break and unlock i am not able to install openSSH, installer, video recorder is installed but not able to open it and not able to load lots of applications which was there already.

As well as could you please reply me i am getting lots of error messages while installing any kind of application.

Regards

Sam

Reply

6 nougiw July 2, 2009 at 7:28 pm

Me too. Just like sam. I’m getting error messages for almost anything I try to dl and install form cydia. Even some essential updates it says I should dl or else I’m going to have problems. Particularly for SSH it gives me a “couldn’t configure pre-depend dpkg for ncurses, probably a dependency cycle” error. Any help or ideas? Thanks…

Reply

7 Robert December 6, 2009 at 11:10 am

Hi Simon,

Everything went fine until….. I did the jailbreak and installed openSSH using Cydia and then installed Cyberduck on my Mac. Then went to open connection after retrieving the ip from the iphone and using root and alpine got connection failed. Not sure why. My mac is connected to a home network and the iphone uses that without any issues

Reply

8 Nicole August 13, 2009 at 5:17 pm

i did exactly as you wrote but i end up with network connection time out?
any ideas on how to fix this?

Reply

9 Simon Ng August 14, 2009 at 1:30 am

@Nicole, looks like your iPhone is not enabled with SSH. If you’re sure you have installed OpenSSH, try to restart your iPhone and try again.

Reply

10 Charles August 25, 2009 at 9:11 am

“You may be curious why you can use SSH on iPhone. Is SSH just designed for Unix?”

Many LOLS…

SSH is a protocol. It has NOTHING to do with UNIX/LINUX. It is the secure replacement for Telnet. Like any protocol it is used for communication and is not OS specific, even though most bare bones Linux kernels support it. I realize you’re trying to dumb this down for the average Mac users (read people who can’t use a toaster sans epic fail unless Steve Job’s puts an i in front of it).

While I have an iPhone, the first thing I did was jailbreak it. One thing I couldn’t stand about Apple in the 1980’s and now is their insane level of control over everything you can do on your Mac/iPhone/iPod. It’s ridiculous, and they’ll never change. They’re like the “Pied Piper” stringing people along with promises of a better experience as long as you assimilate to their domination which is why the Linux/Windows market will always prevail. Linux may be a bit behind the curve in friendliness, and Windows has struggled, but both are catching up to Macs, especially Windows with the WPF initiative.

Reply

11 Claus September 5, 2009 at 1:43 am

Hi .need help .have a 3gs. Have one pc with xp professionel where my iphone can wifi connect with winscp and openssh and ex internet explorer and discover app but a vista and xp home edition where nothing works but my old first generation works with all pc. What are my two computers missing to be able to communicate with my 3gs?

Reply

12 Simon Ng September 5, 2009 at 1:57 am

@Claus, to use SSH for file transfer, you need to jailbreak your iPhone 3GS first. So, are you using jailbroken iPhone? If yes, you can install OpenSSH via cydia and then transfer file via SSH.

Reply

13 Claus September 5, 2009 at 5:06 pm

Hi simon. Thank you for answering. I know that and is jailbroken like my first generation iphonw. But the new 3gs do not reply always maybe one in 100 atemts. Grt timeout. Also with cable and tunnel program. Also no reply when use free ftp apps like discover and try to contact with filezille or IE. Like my phone wont answer. If i am lucky an get connection the wifi is extremly slow or the connection stops short after with time out . Turned off autolock and installed keep wake no improvement. There is no iphone support here in denmark and have had it to repair but they said nothing wrong. I do not know what to do. Can use wifi and can easily downloadand stream also from my own media server. Itseems that it is only when my iphone my reply there is problem and suddently it works but very very slow few kb pr sec. But iphone browser i found on internet works perfect with cable on all my pc but i dont think the phone need reply with this. Sorry i am a noob and not good with this why it might sound strange when i tri to explain. Claus

Reply

14 Simon Ng September 9, 2009 at 12:31 am

@Claus, did you try to reset the network setting? You may check out this post and see if it can resolve your wifi issue.

Reply

15 allen September 7, 2009 at 7:08 pm

hi what do i download on to my i phone once i have jaol broke it so i can get free apps on it.

Reply

16 Dusty September 7, 2009 at 9:35 pm

Google.com

That is way off topic for how to SSH and I don’t believe Simon would prefer that to be discussed here.

Use the App Store and support devs to get your downloads for apps and games!!!!!!!!

Reply

17 Dusty September 7, 2009 at 9:36 pm

O ya, its also called Jailbreak, Jailbreaking or Jailbroke iPhone for helping u on ur searches ;)

Reply

18 Claus September 8, 2009 at 2:19 pm

Nobody thathas experiances what i wrote two days ago? 3gs with 3.01. anyone know a website that might help with issues where things just not work? I need more than a recipe for how it should work. Need some expert advice andno one here in denmark. Just blogs which again shows how it should work no experts when there are problems. Hope for some assistance.

Reply

19 vijaya ragha rao January 15, 2010 at 7:39 pm

plz try iphone haking site or redmondpie site to get solution

Reply

20 Claus September 9, 2009 at 9:48 pm

Have reset and restored Multple times and downgraded to 3.0. No change at all.

Reply

21 chris September 23, 2009 at 1:16 pm

hi. i used this tutorial to transfer a .pdf into my iphone. everything went fine. but when i went to open this file via fileviewer, which i got from cydia, i get this:

error:
operation could not be completed.
(webkiterrordomain error 101.)

anybody know how i can open and view this .pdf on my iphone?

thanks.

Reply

22 Simon Ng September 24, 2009 at 12:50 am

@Chris, you can download “File Share” or “Good Reader” from App Store. Both applications can let you read PDF on iPhone.

Reply

23 chris September 23, 2009 at 1:16 pm

oh yeah…it’s a 2g with 3.0 firmware.

Reply

24 chris September 26, 2009 at 12:36 am

thanks a bunch simon ng. much appreciated.

Reply

25 Sergio October 5, 2009 at 4:45 pm

А если посмотреть на это с другой точки зрения то не все так гладко получается

Reply

26 maninder October 7, 2009 at 8:59 pm

Have a jailbroken iphone 2g 2.1 .. i don’t seem to be able to connect thru ssh using winscp or putty.. it tells me “software cause connection to abort” .. Have tried using wifi and via USB as well .. further am using itunes 9 ..
I have installed openSSH on the iphone 2g and ssh is active on it.. further I have the IP of the phone correctly
PLS HELP ..maninder

Reply

27 Manuel Paz October 16, 2009 at 5:53 am

hi !!! i have a mac… how do i change the permissions ?

Reply

28 Jim November 3, 2009 at 9:28 pm

Please, please, please append the post to warn people that they should change their passwords for both accounts (root and mobile) after installing SSH. Again (not for the first time) someone has broken into a range of iPhones over the 3G network, using the default password: see http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2009/11/dutch-hacker-holds-jailbroken-iphones-hostage-for-5.ars

Unfortunately, most SSH tutorials fail to mention this. Yours is one of the first to turn up in a Google search for ‘SSH iPhone’, so it’s important that you warn your readers.

Reply

29 Simon Ng November 12, 2009 at 5:11 pm

@Jim, thanks for your suggestion. Now it’s advised to follow this guide to secure the jailbroken iPhone once SSH is enabled.

Reply

30 Doug November 4, 2009 at 6:14 pm

Speaking of changing the SSH password, in Cydia, there is a nice step by step tutorial. Go to the main menu, scroll down, go to “OpenSSH Access How-To”.

Follow the steps if you haven’t already installed SSH. If you have, then scroll down, and there’s another arrow taking you to “Change default password.” And follow those instructions.

Alternatively, install OpenSSH.
Get your iPhone’s ip address
Open Terminal
Login to your iPhone using “ssh root@
Accept the host key if you are asked
login with password “alpine”
type “passwd”

you will be asked for a new password, but the cursor won’t respond as you type in, so be careful.

you will be asked to repeat the password. again, be careful

all done

Reply

31 Simon Ng November 12, 2009 at 5:11 pm

@Doug, thanks for the great tips!

Reply

32 Jim Frogge November 5, 2009 at 8:47 am

Another Thanks for the know-how show-how! This is great and again your directions are right on!! Thanks again!!
jim frogge in NC!

Reply

33 Sina November 11, 2009 at 5:51 am

Heyy thanks for the tutorial but i jsut have a problem

i have a jail broken iphone 3gs with a wifi connection at home
and i have tried doing the sssh root@(ip-address) thing on “Terminal” on the iphone and it will connect like that but when i do it with WinSCP on my windows Vista Computer it always says that the connect was time-out and i have installed openssh because i can see in both icy and cydia that the program is installed but when i robooted my iphone no ssh program or anything opened up so im very confused :(

any help please?
Thanks alot in advance :)

Best Regards Sina

Reply

34 vijaya raghava rao t May 24, 2010 at 9:11 pm

let me know how to jailbreak and unlock the 3gs iphone (apple)

Reply

35 Simon Ng May 24, 2010 at 9:17 pm

@vijaya,

What version of iPhone OS are you running? If you are using 3.1.2, you can check out blackra1n and blacksn0w for the solution.

Reply

36 cena December 4, 2009 at 5:13 am

wow.. that was easy then expeced… thanks

Reply

37 Sharma December 8, 2009 at 2:48 pm

I can use openssh to do file transfer. But it works only for a while, say for a few minutes. Than the server unexpectedly terminates the connection. Thus I have to reinstal openssh every time to get the connection. Have already changed the password. Is there a way out. Please help.

Reply

38 Jim December 8, 2009 at 4:59 pm

Keep the phone ‘awake’ (don’t let it lock). But anyway, this can happen; I get it too. You don’t need to reinstall OpenSSH. If you install any of the programs that can close and restart OpenSSH, that will be enough. For example, SBSettings has a toggle for SSH. It can quickly turn SSH off and back on, so the connection can be established again.

Alternatively, turning the phone off and on again will work. You can also try a solution using the USB cable (iTunnel, iPhone Tunnel Suite) though I’m not sure whether there is currently a working version.

Reply

39 Sharma December 8, 2009 at 9:12 pm

Thanks Jim. I tried all these. Kept the auto lock on “never”. Used BossPref to turn openssh on and off. Also putting the phone off and on. However, it works only on reinstall and that too for 3 to 5 minutes. Will try itunnel now. But would be grateful for any solution with wifi.

Reply

40 Jim December 8, 2009 at 9:26 pm

Sharma, I suggest you create an account at the hackint0sh.org forum and see if you can find a thread there about this problem. I’m almost sure they exist and you can add a post to one of them asking for help. It is a forum where the most knowledgable technical jailbreak-people are posting.

Reply

41 naomi December 22, 2009 at 6:17 am

i have a mac and i cannot open cyberduck…..when i double click it it appears in the dock and it bounces…and then dissapears…can anyone help me please?

Reply

42 Ross December 26, 2009 at 9:50 pm

Hi Guys

I have successfully copied the files over…now how do i run them (apps) It would appear the only app to extract apps installed this way is called “installulouss”…but as far as i can see you can no longer download it. I have no way of accessing the files i have copied over?

Thanks

Ross

Reply

43 dom December 27, 2009 at 1:52 am

watsup guys im on windows xp and when ever i try to ssh ill add all my information into winscp and when i click login a white screen just pops up ive re downloaded and re jailbroken my iphone 3gs and nothing seems to work. please help i miss being able to ssh and get into my iphone :[ thanks

Reply

44 Dave December 29, 2009 at 1:28 pm

Hi Guys,
I’m new to this, jailbroke my 3GS 3.1.2 using blackra1n. Worked fine. I failed to install openssh when my Cydia was working. Last night my Cydia opens breifly, says loading data, and closes. I can’t get into Cydia. Can’t install openssh without Cydia, Do I need to restore my phone, or is there a way to install openssh without Cydia or re-install Cydia without SShing?

Any help would be appreciated!
Thanks
Dave

Reply

45 Jim December 29, 2009 at 9:25 pm
46 Charlie January 4, 2010 at 2:10 am

If your iPhone is jailbroken, and you are running Mac OSX, you can also install “Netatalk” along with “OpenSSH” from Cydia. With Netatalk installed as well, your iPhone will show up as a device in the finder, making this process even easier, because you will not need any additional software.

Apple Products work perfectly… together

Reply

47 Mark January 6, 2010 at 4:02 am

My Cyberduck also bounces once then closes, but only if I open it from my Applications folder. If I move the Cyberduck file into, say, my downloads folder, it opens fine…

Reply

48 Alex January 17, 2010 at 12:50 pm

hi, i installed openshh on my iphone. and downloaded WINscp. but when i try to login in it just keeps asking for my password and saying access denied. but i have the right password..

Reply

49 Owen January 20, 2010 at 6:57 am

Just a note for anyone trying to transfer photos via SCP, and is wondering how to generate the .THM thumbnail files so you don’t have a page of black in the photo album (it took me ages to work this out!)

The .THM files go in a folder entitled .MISC, which resides in the same directory as the photos. If you’re using linux and have Image Magick, a simple shell command to make the .THM files is:

for i in *.JPG; do convert $i -resize 240 -crop 160×160+40+0 .MISC/`basename $i .JPG`.THM; done

Hope this helps someone …

Reply

50 vietdo January 25, 2010 at 3:30 pm

I’ve got the window vista, netframe 3.5, itune 9. My iphone firmware’s 3.1.2. When i try to putty to my phone and got the message: connection refused. Then, I tried this command on mobile terminal ssh root@127.0.0.1 then got the message: connection closed by remote host. Do you think iphone itself lock the connection to host? any help much be appreciated. Viet

Reply

51 Jim January 26, 2010 at 2:01 am

127.0.0.1 is not the right address. See the details of your wifi connection (in Settings… Wi-Fi…) for the right address.

Reply

52 vietdo January 26, 2010 at 10:35 am

You mean with mobile terminal, I can only ssh to iphone with wifi setting? Normally, i connect iphone to computer by usb cable and thought 127.0.0.1 is default address. I will try with wifi to see the difference. thanks

Reply

53 vietdo January 26, 2010 at 11:07 am

I’ve tested with wifi. It’s also the same result “connection close by remote host. Any help

Reply

54 Jim January 26, 2010 at 11:12 am

If you ssh into your phone through the USB cable, you need to have iTunnel running on your computer. Why you’d use MobileTerminal on your phone to make an ssh connection to itself I don’t understand. You’re already logged into the phone once you have started MobileTerminal on the phone…

Reply

55 vietdo January 26, 2010 at 8:03 pm

Dear Jim,
It might be silly when i tried to connect to itself. Because I just want to test openssh work or not on iphone. Could you tell me why i need itunnel running on my computer? which version of itunnel should i install now?

Reply

56 Jim January 26, 2010 at 8:17 pm

iTunnel allows your computer to ’see’ the phone through the USB cable as if it’s a device on the local network, at address 127.0.0.1 on port 22 (or any other port you specify when launching iTunnel). Once that is achieved, PuTTY can make an ssh connection to that address.

I think iTunnel is now at version 9. You may also need to copy a .dll file from one of iTunes’ program directories, and you probably need a recent version of iTunes with which you have already connected the phone. Google will provide more instructions.

That said, if your computer and your iPhone are on the same local network (e.g. the computer is 192.168.100.2 and the phone 192.168.100.3), PuTTY should normally be able to connect to root@192.168.100.3 on port 22. If not, maybe your router doesn’t allow connections between its clients. That can usually be changed in the router’s settings.

Reply

57 Sean January 26, 2010 at 9:57 am

i am also having the issue where its telling me that i dont have the correct password any help would be greatly appreciated for me and the other poster above me thanks

Reply

58 vietdo January 26, 2010 at 10:36 am

if you don’t change the password, just login by root, password is alpine. It’s default setting.

Reply

59 Sean January 26, 2010 at 10:44 am

thanks for the quick reply bro

Reply

60 Nipun jain January 26, 2010 at 5:01 pm

dude i try to download open ssh but cant … it says “Http://apt.saurik.com host unreachable.” and also can u tell me how can i disable APN without doing SSH or any thing complicated . something simple would be great!

Reply

61 Sai January 27, 2010 at 9:41 am

I coudnt get the password to work

Reply

62 Nick January 27, 2010 at 6:48 pm

Tried to set up an SSH connection, but ran into a problem:

I/O Error: Connection failed
sftp://192.168.1.11
There was a problem while connecting to 192.168.1.11:22

Any Help?

Thanks.

Reply

63 Bojan February 15, 2010 at 5:24 pm

worked for me tnx

Reply

64 Nice2beat April 21, 2010 at 4:39 am

Where did u then find the files on the iPhone/iPod Touch?
What folder/directory/application?

Reply

65 jay March 14, 2010 at 4:49 am

Nice work simon!!!
Muchos Gracias

Reply

66 jake March 23, 2010 at 11:41 pm

I had the same problem as Alex…when the root@###.###.#.# window shows up it says:
Searching for host…
Connecting to host…
Authenticating…
Using username “root”.
Authenticating with pre-entered password.
Access denied.

then it asks for the password…i tried “alpine” but that failed. there is a checkbox that says “Change stored password to this one” but that doesn’t work either…if someone could help me out with this that would be great (and yes, i have openssh, my ipod is jailbroken, and i tried username “root” password “alpine”)

Reply

67 Ridell March 27, 2010 at 2:46 am

I have exactly same error as jake above. I have tried from a Mac too but same error. The good old “dottie” doesnt work either and I’m sure I used alpine before.

HEEEEEELP!

Reply

68 Vito March 29, 2010 at 11:44 pm

I have an itouch 1g, jailbroken, running 3.1.2 firmware, i have open ssh and toggle ssh, winSCP, and have put in my IP Adress 10.x.x.x, the user name “root”, and the password “alpine”. i’m SFTP with SCP fallback enabled, and everytime i go to to login I just get a white box that shows no text, before returning with a message that says “Network error. Connection Timed Out” every time. any ideas?

Reply

69 James March 31, 2010 at 4:35 am

i have an iphone 3g, jailbroken, openssh and everything and everytime i try to ssh into my phone it says “access denied. wrong password” or something like that… idk what to do it used to work evertime i tried it but now it jus wont work…. PLEASE HELP ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Reply

70 Alex April 8, 2010 at 4:06 pm

Thank you very much. I just jailbroke my iphone and had no idea what ssh or anything like that meant. Your guide was all I needed to make my own theme and it turned out just the way it should. 5 star guide.

Reply

71 roy April 13, 2010 at 12:46 am

How do you transfer music and videos from itunes to iphone through cyberduck on a mac.

I have everything already and have been messing around with ssh (all new to me) and figured out how it works, but I cannot figure out how to add movies or songs.

The reason I need to do this is because my iphone 3g charges but does not sync to itunes… dunno why and out of warranty. my computer does not even recognize it.

I did however figure out that I can convert my movies from itunes to .mov and save it onto my iphonevideorecorder from cydia and play it on my phone through that app. I just want to know if there is a way to add my movies to the “Videos” section on my phone through ssh/cyberduck.

any help please!!
Thanks

Reply

72 khalil April 14, 2010 at 6:48 pm

hey there..
im trying to SSH into my iphone (firmware 3.0)
but it is not working.. the error i get is “server unexpectedly closed network connection”

any hepl please?? thanks in advance

Reply

73 Stephanie April 16, 2010 at 6:17 pm

I have a iPhone 2G, jailbroken and unlocked. I installed OpenSSH and Winscp in order to change the default new text message tone. Installation went fine and Winscp opened fine and I was able to connect to my iPhone. I tried a couple of times to drag and drop a new tone into the right pane, but it didn’t work. After reading on the internet, I discovered how to do this and it worked fine. I have a new sound for new text messages. My problem is that before using SSH, my phone was recognized by iTunes. Now, iTunes doesn’t recognize and I get an the error message “iTunes could not connect to this iPhone because an unknow error occurred (0xE8000022).”
The only solution I can find on the internet is to “Restore”. I’m afraid to do this because I don’t want to lose my jailbreak or unlock or have my iphone updated to 3.1.3.
Please help me find a solution. Thanks in advance.

Reply

74 Simon Ng April 18, 2010 at 11:09 pm

@Stephanie,

Looks like you need to restore your iPhone via iTunes to fix the problem. As you are using iPhone 2G, it’s not a problem to upgrade to 3.1.3. It can still be jailbroken and unlocked. You can follow this guide and use redsn0w to jailbreak the iPhone.

Reply

75 zarah sayed April 20, 2010 at 3:03 pm

can someone please help i have tried transferring photos from pc to iphone using winscp … i drag and drop from the right side of winscp to the left so that it can reach my phone, however when i go back and chk the photo is not there on my iphone :( plz help

Reply

76 zarah sayed April 20, 2010 at 3:06 pm

/private/var/mobile/Media/DCIM/100APPLE

i am on this link of winscp and i try to drop my pc photos to this link on winscp and i dont find them once i go back to my iphone plz help :(

Reply

77 Simon Ng April 21, 2010 at 12:46 am

@zarah,

Actually, the “Photo” application on iPhone does not display the original photos directly. Instead, it only shows you the resized photos which can be found under /private/var/mobile/Media/DCIM/100APPLE/.MISC folder.

Reply

78 Nice2beat April 21, 2010 at 4:37 am

I transferred a video clip with WinSCP but where do I now find this clip on the iPod Touch?

Reply

79 Nutzy April 26, 2010 at 1:45 am

thx a lot for this informative post – i got everything to work on my laptop and the connection seems to work fine. now what? i am a newbie with iphone and i have no idea on how to use this or what can i do with it.

any more info and links will be highly appreciated.

thx

Reply

80 reistarz May 5, 2010 at 9:35 pm

hi! those who cant connect and are having network connection timeout, don’t use the Wi-Fi IP Address. if you have SBSsettings installed, u can see the Data IP Address stated. Use that address instead. It works for me! remember to turn on ur SSH too! hope it helps! :)

Reply

81 gerrono May 19, 2010 at 5:03 pm

When the transfer was completed (from pc to iphone) I have no way of accessing the files i have copied over? How or where can i found these files.

Reply

82 Simon Ng May 20, 2010 at 12:40 am

@gerrono, you can install iFile through Cydia to access the files.

Reply

83 Big Q May 24, 2010 at 3:36 am

I think I changed my password now i cant remember it. How can I retrieve or change it?

Reply

84 Zjeans May 24, 2010 at 9:58 am

Hi everyone,

I could ‘SSH’ fine into my iphone (2G firmware 3.0) but when i go to private/var/root/Media, there is no folders whatsoever there. <- is this normal? (btw ihave no songs/pics/videos yet in my iphone)
I just wanted to read .pdf. So i created a folder there "PDF", transferred the .pdf file, but i dont see the icon on my iphone. Went to use ajireader but it doesnt detect my ebook.

Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

Reply

85 mjamz May 26, 2010 at 10:15 am

You can currently SSH from your mac to iPhone over USB with the python-client of Héctor Martín Canteros usbmuxd distribution. There is a small HowTo from phonique:
http://forums.macrumors.com/showpost.php?p=8915569&postcount=16

Reply

86 Kaz May 28, 2010 at 8:31 pm

This article is very useful for us thanks.

i am window user, when i am transfering huge file 1.5 gb to IPHONE , after an hour connection of my iphone drop and after then i am unable to connect from my window then i have to reinstall openssh when reinstall it will work but again after approx hours connection drop , i tried several time but not succeed can you please help.

Thanks

Reply

87 luka Fent May 29, 2010 at 9:33 pm

hey ive downloaded it all but what happens is when i click log in it come up with a box asking for a password again and i put in alpine and it says access denied???????
what do i do? please help!

Reply

88 josh nim May 30, 2010 at 8:16 am

ye im havong the same problems as luka i dont know what to do?

Reply

89 ella smith May 30, 2010 at 8:18 am

please help im having the exact same problems i reeally dont know what to do.
it just says accses denied i dont know??

Reply

90 nipun May 30, 2010 at 2:12 pm

how to unlock iphone 3gs? 3.1.2

Reply

91 Simon Ng May 30, 2010 at 2:38 pm

@nipun,

For unlock, you can use blacksn0w. Here is the guide.

Reply

92 Andrew Bauer June 1, 2010 at 5:52 am

So I put some music files on it but how do i listen to them? They don’t show up in my library.

Reply

93 Khalil June 2, 2010 at 7:20 am

Why dis u ignore my post man?

Reply

94 Simon Ng June 3, 2010 at 12:58 am

@Khalil,

I suggest you to reinstall both OpenSSH and OpenSSL. Reboot your iPhone and see if it works again.

BTW, remember to set the “Auto-Lock” to “Never”. You can find it in Settings -> General -> Auto-Lock.

Reply

95 ann June 26, 2010 at 10:33 am

When I open up WinSCP I enter in my IP addy in the host box…then root for username and alpine for password, when I click ‘login’ I get a pop up saying “network error. permission denied” also, when I open up my terminal i type ssh run@(my iphone ip addy) and it says its not valid……could my router have anything to do w/ this since its a secure router? dumb question, but the more i mess w/ this iphone and cycorder the more i hate technology! just so aggravating. thanks for any help.

Reply

96 moiz June 29, 2010 at 4:50 am

i dun have OPENSSH can i do something my cydia is not opening

Reply

97 Ahmad Magdy July 7, 2010 at 7:53 am

Does that apply on the new OS 4 ? please answer ASAP !!

Reply

98 Simon Ng July 10, 2010 at 12:07 am

@Ahmad,

Yes.

Reply

99 garrett July 11, 2010 at 12:45 pm

I finally got this to work…..
Got all my videos off my phone with sftp
Use your IP address
Settings>Wifi>Click on connection to see IP address
Or it is now listed in the top part of the App itself
Use this IP addy as host…
BossPrefs – Turn SSH on…
It would not work for me defining port 8080…I left it blank!
Couldn’t get it with Cyberduck or Filezilla….
Had to use old faithful: Rbrowser…purchased version….
I use this all the time so it is worth it! FTP and SFTP
user: root
pass: alpine
files are located at: /private/var/mobile/Applications/5BCBAF3E-2FB8-482B-86BC-0F795AC9370C/Documents

Reply

100 Frank July 22, 2010 at 12:17 am

Great tips and a thorough tutorial, but I’m afraid it’s too complicated for most people. :( Why not just use a service like FilesDIRECT – super easy to use, 128-bit encryption on all your files, and it’s accessible from any browser. Nice and simple!

Reply

101 Jim July 26, 2010 at 6:52 pm

Frank, perhaps people want actual access to their phone’s system (including all the system files), so they can actually make changes to what it does. The app you are advertising simply allows you to view a few of your own files on the phone, IF you’re online, at $18 per month. That is no bargain! You can buy excellent apps to view/edit your own files AND the system files at a fraction of that (e.g. iFile).

Anyway, if you want to advertise your overpriced service, please pay for the ad instead of spamming someone else’s blog.

Reply

102 reko yunasril July 28, 2010 at 9:24 pm

THe OpenSSH has be install but i can’t remote my Iphone….

Reply

103 Mindy August 4, 2010 at 1:41 pm

I have a question about SSH and security. I have not installed OpenSSH. I do not really want the ability to transfer files to the phone right now.

So…does that mean that no one outside (like hackers) can get into my phone? Even if I haven’t change the root password yet?

In other words, is the only way to get into the phone by installing OpenSSH, which will allow me to turn on SSH? Or is SSH always on?

Thanks for your help.

Reply

104 Jim August 10, 2010 at 12:03 am

You don’t need to worry. As long as no server is running on your iPhone, no-one can access it over the internet (with or without the correct password), so there’s no need to change the password. Servers are things like SSH, HTTP etc., which are not installed by default.

Reply

105 opo August 4, 2010 at 11:41 pm

If you found some problem that didn’t got a solution you can check New4gsm.com blog here: http://www.news4gsm.com/2010/08/04/downgrade-iphone-3g-ios-4-to-3-1-3-got-stuck-guide-8326

So what will this guide explain?

- Slow iPhone 3G iOs 4 solution
- Downgrade iPhone 3G from firmware 4 to 3.1.3
- Restore error in iTunes code : 1601, 1602, 1603, 1604, 1608, 1609, 1611, 1612.
- Restore error in iTunes code : 1002, 1011, 1013, 1014, 1015.
- In-out Restore Mode using RecBoot
- Redsn0w is unable to recognize the 3.1.2 or 3.1.3 firmware.
- Cydia error : apt.saurik.com host unreachable.
- Saurik repository : dev-team repository to Cydia (repo666.ultrasn0w.com).
- Accessing iPhone as root solution

Reply

106 Jake August 9, 2010 at 9:20 pm

I too had the problem of the connection timeout when connecting to my iPod Touch 1G 3.1.3 using WinSCP, however managed to find a fix for it which is working well so far!

I went into my WiFi connections and told my iPod to forget the network that I was connected to. I then re-connected, entering the password in again, and tried connecting to the iPod using WinSCP which then worked!

Hope this will help some people with their problems

Reply

107 abbas August 21, 2010 at 5:53 am

hey i got every thing write in the winscp login but it gives me network error… any one had this problem

Reply

108 nomi August 21, 2010 at 5:58 am

hey i write every thing right in the winscp login but it gives me network error… any one had this problem

Reply

109 votu August 29, 2010 at 2:00 am

Dear Simon,
It was very interesting to follow your directions transferring files from PC to iPhone with Open SSH and WinSCP. It was very wonderful. But I could use this way only for a few times. Now I cannot connect my iPhone to PC. I try to connect step by step as you directs and it says: “Network error: Connection refused”. What is wrong here? Could you please explain the problem and help me use it again?
I’m looking forward to hearing from you.

Regards

Reply

110 Simon Ng August 29, 2010 at 9:00 pm

@votu,

Did you keep your iPhone turn ON while you are transferring the file? I suggest to disable the Auto-lock feature. You can go to Settings -> General -> Auto-Lock and set it to Never.

Reply

111 votu August 30, 2010 at 12:50 am

Dear Simon,
I followed your suggestions, but it still doesn’t work. Could you give me other suggestions to solve the problem?

Reply

Leave a Comment

{ 14 trackbacks }

Previous post:

Next post:

Get smart with the Thesis WordPress Theme from DIYthemes.