Often, routers and firewalls are not configured for (HTTP) remote maintenance due to security concerns or default settings of the devices.
You can use the port-forwarding capability of SSH to access these devices as long as you have an SSH server accessible through the firewall/router as is the case for most of our clients.
From a Linux Workstation
ssh -l <username> -L <local-port>:<ip.or.name-of.host>:<remote-port> <ip.or.name-of.firewall>
ex: ssh -l root -L 8080:192.168.2.1:80 sshserver.yourdomain.org
Where sshserver.yourdomain.org is the external IP of the firewall/router we want to configure and 192.168.2.1 is its internal IP to be accessed via a web browser for programming.
Then, use a web browser on the Linux workstation to browse to:
http://localhost:8080
PuTTY on Windows can be used in the same way.
Older versions of PuTTy may not have this capability. For Windows you can download and install PuTTy (SSH Client for Windows) here:
http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/download.html
To configure, create and save an SSH session in PuTTy to the Linux server at the remote location.
-Load the saved session
-Click the plus sign next to SSH in the left pane
-Click Tunnels. For "Source" port use port number to be forwarded.
-Destination is IP of device on remote network plus port.
Source Port ex: 8080
Destination ex: 192.168.2.1:80
-Leave other settings at default
-Click the Add button
-Click Session at the top of the left pane
-Click Save
Log into remote Linux server.
In IE http://localhost:8080 will connect you to the internal web interface of the device at the remote network.
This same method can be used to port forward to any device on the network bypassing the firewall. For example to use VNC to remote control a workstation use port 5900 as source and destination.
Note: you must be root to forward low-numbered ports.
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