vx / connectbot

Enhanced version of the popular ConnectBot SSH and telnet client

VX ConnectBot

Copyright (c) 2012 Martin Matuška

Description

VX ConnectBot is an enhanced version of the popular open-source telnet and secure shell (SSH) client ConnectBot.

Features and enhancements

• based on ConnectBot 1.7.1
• background file transfer (SCP protocol)
• screen capture (save a PNG screenshot of the console)
• character picker dialog (on-screen and hardware SYM keys)
• single line input (on-screen key)
• tap-and-hold to toggle full screen mode or change font size
• tap-and hold on on-screen buttons with various manus
• ssh-agent from Roberto Tyley
• X11 forwarding support

New key mappings:

• ALT + Up Arrow maps to Page Up
• ALT + Down Arrow maps to Page Down
• ALT + Left Arrow maps to Home
• ALT + Right Arrow maps to End
• ALT + Backspace maps to Insert
• Search key maps to URL scan

Device Customization

VX ConnectBot aims to provide customizations for Android devices with a physical keyboard. Currently, there are customizations for the following devices:

• Full hardware keyboard (e.g. external bluetooth keyboard)
• ASUS Transformer Pad Series Mobile Dock
• Samsung Captivate Glide (SGH-i927)
• Sony Ericsson Xperia pro (MK16i)
• Sony Ericsson Xperia mini pro (SK17i)

The following devices with physical keyboards are also reported to work properly:

• Motorola Droid 4 (XT894)

Individual key mappings can be viewed here

License

VX ConnectBot is licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0

Download

VX Connectbot Homepage

VX Connectbot on Android Market

Credits

This software is based on ConnectBot

ConnectBot Copyright (c) 2007-2011 Kenny Root, Jeffrey Sharkey

Based in part on the Trilead SSH2 client, provided under a BSD-style license. Copyright (c) 2007 Trilead AG.

Also based on JTA Telnet/SSH client, provided under the GPLv2 license. Copyright (c) Matthias L. Jugel, Marcus Meiner 1996-2005.

Also based in part on the JSOCKS library, provided under the GNU LGPL license. (c)

Also based in part on JZlib provided under a BSD-style license. Copyright (c) JCraft, Inc., 2000-2004

This software includes modifications from Irssiconnectbot developed by Iiro Uusitalo and Ville Kerminen.

This software includes the ssh-agent service developed by Roberto Tyley.

SCP file transfer support is badsed on modifications by Kartikaya Gupta.

Internal file selection dialog is based on Android File Dialog by Alexander Ponomarev, provided under a BSD-style license.

connectbot's Issues

Implement Network Service Discovery

ConnectBot should display all the announced ssh servers on the local network.

The discovery is available on Android 4.1 and later, and explained at:
http://developer.android.com/training/connect-devices-wirelessly/nsd.html#discover

Enhancement: Unlock keys on demand

Command line ssh will determine if a server will accept a given public key before needing to unlock the private key

It would be nice if vx connectbot supported doing this with its keys as well, so that one doesn't need to manually go into the pubkeys and unlock the correct one(s) before making a connection.

too many window size changes by vx connectbot swype

constant window size changes make it challenging to use less, which aborts various interactions on window size change, and vim, which unfortunately crashes after a few too many window size changes in insert mode. i submit this here with the possibly naive presumption that such swype behaviour is somehow controllable by the application. i realize i could use another soft keyboard, but swype really is quite a bit faster to use.

Add support for mosh

I use a physical keyboard most of the time and found VX connectbot to be the best suited fork. I can only think of one thing Im missing: support for mosh. I often move between 3G and WiFi and mosh is a life saver on slower connections as well as when you switch between networks. Another good thing is that it can actually save battery if you have the connections idle (when doing other things on the tablet) or transfer a lot of data (at least the irssi connectbot mosh-implementation).

https://github.com/ddrown/irssiconnectbot has the mosh support. Havent looked at the source yet but talked to the developer and he said that there is only a small part that connects mosh with connectbot.

Some function keys stop responding on Mini Pro

Device : Xperia Mini Pro (SK17i)
VX connectbot version : 1.7.1-16
Custom Keymap configuration : Sony Ericsson Xperia (mini) pro

Description : sometimes shift key and the blue function key stop responding in VX connectbot (and only in VX connectbot). If I kill and restart VX connectbot, they work again.

Merge Connectbot Bluetooth keyboard fix

Hi there,

there's a fix for an annoying issue that prevents many keys from working on BT keyboards, here:

https://code.google.com/p/connectbot/issues/detail?id=369 (comment 55)

Could you please apply it to vx connectbot? Thanks!

Andreas

Cannot generate DSA keys

When trying to generate a DSA key, after giving a random seed, the app simply terminates the key generation dialogue immediately without generating any key.

We're using an asus eepad transformer TF201 with Android 4, latest VX ConnectBot.

Serial Connection via USB OTG / Bluetooth

It would be very nice if one would be able to use a USB to Serial adapter together with a USB OTG cable or a Bluetooth Serial Converter together with connectbot.

All other Serial Terminals available for Android are not as advanced as connectbot is!

Xperia X10 mini pro support

How hard would it be to add support for the X10 mini pro's hardware keyboard? I've got a rooted X10 mini pro and it seems like I can build the apk from this source, but I don't know if adding some mapping would require trail and error on the device to get the keycodes and then just put the X10 specific mapping in some java configuration resource? Where do I start with this issue?

Mosh support

http://mosh.mit.edu/

"Mosh
(mobile shell)

Remote terminal application that allows roaming, supports intermittent connectivity, and provides intelligent local echo and line editing of user keystrokes.

Mosh is a replacement for SSH. It's more robust and responsive, especially over Wi-Fi, cellular, and long-distance links."

Here is some info about an android port: mobile-shell/mosh#32 from what I can gather they have a working client but they need someone to incorporate this into a connectbot, having vx connectbot support this would be awsome!

First shell to support Mosh :D

Alt behavior incorrect

I am using a Samsung Epic 4G running CM9. In vanilla ConnectBot, pressing the Fn key allows one to enter the alternate character on the physical keyboard. For example, Fn+q enters a tilde (~), Fn+d enters a pipe (|), etc... This is the default behavior for all applications.

In VX ConnectBox, Fn is intercepted and treated as the Alt key. This makes entering '~' and '|' very difficult. The only way to enter them is via the Sym key and by selecting them from a dialog.

While the Alt key is useful to have, it is not typed anywhere as often as a tilde or a pipe for most SSH connections. It is alright to tap the screen every time you need an Alt key, but it is not alright to need to tap the screen for every tilde, pipe, semicolon, exclamation mark, less than symbol, greater than symbol, question mark, period, etc...

vxconnectbot can't forward any port (local)

Hi. I have VXconnectbot installed on an HTC Desire GSM. My remote SSH server is located behind a router, port 22 properly forwarded and all.

I have SSH access (password- and key-based) alright, but the local port forwards associated to my host entry can never be enabled. I tried with a Wi-Fi and 3G connection (to eliminated speed issues), same problem. I even tried from within the same LAN, still nothing. I can enable local port forwards with an ssh command through the standard Terminal Emulator and through the SSHtunnel app (they only support password-based logins, though). The ports I've tried forwarding (same for source and destination) are 9091, 49152, 8080, 9, 3389. No luck with any of them, they always return the same standard error "Problem creating port forward...". I couldn't find any solution online.

Looking through the source, I found that the LocalAcceptThread version using INetSocketAddress is used for enabling port forwards. Perhaps if it was changed to the LocalAcceptThread that's using a simple int for the port, forwards might not fail. Tell me what more info I can give you to troubleshoot the problem, as I like VxConnectBot a lot, and I'd hate to use an alternative.

Thanks!
Bill

No status for uploads and downloads

It is impossible to know when a file has finished uploading or downloading due to a lack of a status report.

Can't select from sym menu by physical keyboard

Looks like I can't select from sym window any character by physical keyboard. Every keypress goes straight to current connection, like arrows or enter.

EDIT: There is something broken with github for me as I can't comment anything, but it works for me now with version 1.7.1-24, Android 4.1.1 (paranoidandroid) and physical keyboard.

Persist Connection does not work

VX Connectbot does not stay running when switching activities, regardles of the state of the checkbox for persist connection. This makes it impossible to copy data from another app into a remote session (such as a one-time password) or to use the port forwarding options.

I have experienced this problem on my Motorola Droid 4 and my Asus Eee Pas Slider.

Unable to export private ssh key

I have to export my private keys to a key escrow system, but I am unable to export my private key. One of two issues is causing this. Either:

1. Adding encryption to the key (an old version of ConnectBot apparently exported the key sans password) caused it to no longer be exportable.
2. The act of importing the key caused it to no longer be exportable.

Edit: Confirmed that I began to be unable to export the private key when adding a password. Does this actually encrypt the key or just add a password for it?

Download doesnt work

Hi

Im using the latest version of vxconnectbot, and i'm having trouble downloading files from a current ssh session. this session uses SSH keys. When i try to download a file i get a message that says Download Error. i have checked permissions and everything is fine...
Any ideas of what could be wrong?
thanks

Make a way to import Connectbot settings

Hi there,

I have a ton of Connectbot host records. Migrating them all (and the pubkeys) to VX connectbot is a pain I'd like to avoid. I'd like an automated solution, if possible.

Thanks!
Andreas

Missing menu soft key

With 1.7.1-23, the menu soft key is missing. This key is on the window title bar which was suppressed with the new version. I'm running Android 4.0.4 on a Motorola Photon Q, and have no problems w/ 1.7.1-21. Thanks for the great app!

Can't type some symbols on my Asus TF101 with virtual keyboard

User reports:
"I'm using Asus android pad TF101 with hardware keyboard. In normal time, I can type the !@#$%^&*() (shift+number keys) with no problem. But in a connectbot terminal, I just can't do that. Shift+1(or 2 3 4) gives me nothing but a beep, and shift+5 (or 6 7 8 9 0) gives me a ~. "

ENHANCEMENT: VisualHostKey support

would be nice to be able to see this on login. i know a lot of people are going to beak about this, but it's pretty useful for me and much more so when loggin in on a cellphone. seems like a good fit.

anyway. that would be a great feature addition to an already great product. it's one of the VERY few apps i recommend without any caveats or waffling... :)

thanks for your time.

RFE: Please add an option to disable Ctrl+<letter> shortcuts

For me, it is far more useful to have things like Ctrl-d, Ctrl-w, Ctrl-c, etc. (on the hardware keyboard) go to the terminal and not be used as shortcuts within the application. I realize that this may be quite different for other people, so I would suggest an option to have chorded Ctrl- presses always sent to the terminal.

Function keys (F1-F12)

It would be nice to have a way to send function keys.

I think this is what caused issues with ConnectBot and the Asus Transformer series' keyboard dock, since according to this* Shift + 0-9 were mapped to the Fn keys, while on the Transformers they were used for the normal number row symbols, so users trying to type a symbol would get the code for a function key instead.

*http://code.google.com/p/connectbot/wiki/KeyboardShortcuts

cannot customize action for search button

The settings for version 23 has an option for choosing what action occurs when the search button is pressed. I selected "ESC", but yet when I press the search button, the app does the url scan action.

I'm on a Droid3 gingerbread.

symbol encoding is always utf-8

As a proud owner of the xperia mini pro, I really love your patch for connectbot, especially the control key and being able to manually select which symbols I want to use.

The only issue I have is with the character encoding for the symbols: I use connections in both utf-8 and iso8859-1 and the symbols are always echoed in utf-8. I don't know how easy this would be to implement (I believe the java String class has all it needs, but I am not familiar enough with android to submit a patch...), but it would be great if symbols that also exist in the terminal's encoding were output in this encoding.

Don't monitor network state when in local mode

When using VX ConnectBot as a Terminal Emulator ("local" mode) with WiFi enabled, if WiFi is turned off or get out of range, the app will prompt: "Lost connection, close session?"

Same issue exists when using EDGE data connection. When the network is not available, VX ConnectBot
will say that "Lost connection". But I don't care about network connection when in local mode. :-(

That's quite unhelpful if user is performing some important job (z.B. using Vim to edit files) and did not save it. VX ConnectBot should not monitor network state when in "local" mode.

Please fix this bug! Thanks!

Thank you again for such a good work!

ISSUE: can't import keys from ssh-keygen

keep getting parsing errors when i try to import the public keys generated from ssh-keygen on our new CentOS server. strikes me as odd as this should be a pretty easy thing to do... and yes. i've tried converting to OpenSSH in case i accidentally genned SSH2.

please help. this is a pretty friggin' big roadblock.

thanks.

using id_rsa key

This may have been covered, and if so I apologize and would appreciate redirection.

I've been using connectbot with the hackers keyboard and it was using my id_rsa file for ssh. This is on a Nexus 7 and all of the apps mentioned below have been loaded using google play.

I just purchased an amazon-branded BT kb and while it works with connectbot, none of the keys like esc, control, etc register.

I tried VX Connectbot and it works like a charm. Thus far I can't find anything that doesn't work right.

My question is that when I configured my account on connectbot it lets me specify the id_rsa file but VX CB doesn't seem to have that option.

Any help would be appreciated.

add ctrl+a+d (close connection) to custom camera button mapping

add ctrl+a+d (close connection) to custom camera button mapping

Force close when selecting symbols

After bringing up the symbols picker, selecting any symbol causes a force close to occur.

VX Connectbot Version: 1.7.1-18
Android version: 2.2.2
Device: Motorola XPRT.

Invalid

Ignore this report.

Widgets - Add a new widget linked to a host don't store screen size info

The widget (linked to a HOST) don't store screen size info (pinch zoom).
I have to re-zoom / change screen size every time.

a great option would be 'disable' keys too

Right now, for the volume keys, I can choose 'none' or various key assignments.

If I choose 'none', the default Android map of 'change volume' is used. However, my volume keys are in a location that often gets pressed when typing.

It would perhaps be advantageous to have a 'disable' option, so that the key is snagged from global usage, and then invalidated.

Please add an advanced add host option

I would like to be able to add hosts via the interface you get when you use the 'Edit Host' option. Perhaps make this a menu option?

Combined accentuated characters can't by typed

On TF700T, slovak accentuated characters that need to be combined from two keystrokes can't be entered on physical keyboard. For example ó needs to be typed as acute and o, but this doesn't work.

Some characters can be entered in unexpected ways - e.g. Č works by pressing caron and then backspace. This is due to a fact, that backspace key has a keycode of 67 which is exactly the ASCII code for letter C.

For combined characters, VX Connectbot doesn't translate raw keycode of the second pressed key into corresponding ASCII character and instead delivers the raw keycode to the terminal window. This obviously fails, since raw keycode for A is 29 - but we need its ASCII value (65).

The problem seems to be in TerminalKeyListener.java, line 241 in this code snippet:

if (mDeadKey != 0) {
uchar = KeyCharacterMap.getDeadChar(mDeadKey, keyCode);
mDeadKey = 0;
}

keyCode needs to be translated into ASCII value first (getUnicodeChar?)

Unable to type capital letters on virtual keyboard

Mobile phone: Huawei U8815

Issue: Unable to type capital letters on virtual keyboard even though I definitely pressed SHIFT and then the letter, only to see the letter change to lowercase. Has anyone else seen this issue?

Confirmation dialogues pop behind virtual keyboards

On my phone, a Galaxy Nexus, any sort of confirmation dialogue (e.g. "Are you sure you want to continue connecting") pop behind the virtual keyboard. Oddly, this doesn't happen 100% of the time (e.g. I had one "Connection closed, do you with to disconnect" dialogue pop behind and another pop above). This happens in both landscape and portrait mode.

Can't use Ctrl-R on a hardware keyboard

import key and settings from connectbot

I don't know if it's possible though?

I can copy the private key from connectbot to the clipboard, it would be cool if I can just paste it in vx.ConnectBot.

But what about the server list?

ps.
sorry that this is half a support question, but I couldn't find an irc/mail list for this kind of questions.

Allow to use back-key as ESC

VX Connectbot is really great, as a heavy VIM user I miss only one feature I like in Android Terminal Emulator, using back-key as ESC. I have Sony Xperia Pro (MK16i) and globe-key is not very convenient for this, especially if you have to press it two times.

If you could add this as an option, I think all VIM users will be grateful :).

It would be nice to utilize volume up/down keys as well (for example for F-n keys), if possible.

Of course the best way would be to allow custom keyboard profile stored in some config-file on sd-card :), but maybe it would complicate the code too much to be practical.

Make a way to import Connectbot settings

Hi there,

I have a ton of Connectbot host records. Migrating them all (and the pubkeys) to VX connectbot is a pain I'd like to avoid. I'd like an automated solution, if possible.

Thanks!
Andreas

Swipe for arrow up/down (and left/right)

My Samsung Galaxy S3 doesn't have a track ball so arrow up/down isn't easily available. I know I can use hackers keyboard or vi mode in the shell and so on, but having swipe gestures for arrow up/down would be a really nice option.

Vx connectbot on Transformer Prime TP201

Please add support for hardware keyboard for TP201. In fact Vx connectbot works fine with Hackers Keyboard, but Hackers Keyboard must be loaded before connectbot, connectbot must be started with hw keyboard reattached. When ssh connection is established then I connect keyboard. Then SHIFT, TAB, CTRL, arrows work as on any other Windows or Linux box, function keys can be used as SHIFT+number which is perfect. But if connectbot crashes (which happens often when I have multiple ssh connections opened) then this keyboard functionality is lost, and whole process must be repeated.
Adding Hackers Keyboard functionality in Vx connectbot would be the best, but it would be great if functionality of Hackers Keyboard would automatically be restored with reloading.

add irssi "- Long press opens popup menu with commands (ctrl+a, ctrl+a+d etc.)" submenu to current long-press menu

as topic says, I'm missing the irssi ctrl+a+d (close connection) from vx's current long-press menu.

Default font setting has no effect on Nexus 7

Doesn't matter which default font size I choose, settings show changed choice but change is not effective in the UI. This is the case in a new connection and also after restarting the app.

Enhancement: something like ssh-copy-id

Can we get something to copy your ssh key to a server so you don't have to copy/paste it?

Thanks.

first connection worked, now all fail

connectbot was installed and working fine. after installing vxconnectbot, the first connection worked, but now all fail, either connectbot or vxconnectbot. it takes my password, i see "Welcome to Ubuntu...Last login...." but get no prompt. i uninstalled both and reinstalled vxconnectbot, didn't help. i suspect some problem derived from having installed both connectbot and vxconnectbot? what can i do? am i relegated to a factory reset? anything else i can do? (samsung galaxy s ii android 2.3.6 kernel 2.6.35.11 GINGERBREAD.UVKL1)

register "send to" intent

picking files from the file system is atypical of android usage. i'd like to suggest that vx connectbot implement the ACTION_SEND an ACTION_SEND_MULTIPLE intents.

a typical use case would be having an image open in the gallery, and sending it to a laptop.

the server selection dialog that ensues when vx connectbot is selected for sending should list both non-connected and connected servers.

Infinite connection attempts if the host does not support password authentication

If password authentication is disabled in sshd and vxconnectbot does not have authorization keys it does infinite connection attempts.
Apparently the issue is inherited from original connectbot: http://code.google.com/p/connectbot/issues/detail?id=452

Problems with Some Keys

I have just installed VX Connectbot to replace Connectbot on my Android phone and ran into an unexpected problem:

When I log in, my password is accepted without any problems, but when I use the keyboard to enter the same password after a sudo command, I have to enter one of the characters in the Alt-section of the keyboard (< in this case), which is sent as ESC + 'd' to the other side instead of as '<'.

I just checked the keyboard and three characters in the Alt-section are not handled correctly, the middle dot, '<' and '>'.