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Unix Shell Accounts?
mcovey asks: "Unix shell accounts used to be easy to find, with quality applications installed and free web space. Nowadays the only free ones left are either not accepting new accounts, have limited applications or send you on a wild goose chase to register. Does anyone know any free or low-cost shell accounts that include compilers, IRC, background processes, FTP, a decent editor and an email app (preferably pine, since I have a config file already on my IMAP server)?"
Just fire up Linux on some dusty old i386, and plug it into your home network. What's so special about having a hosted account?
RHCE; are you certified? Karma: ambiguous.
I'm sure there are plenty of people that own dedicated hosts that would be happy to offer shell accounts, if only the company that they rent from would allow it. I own several dedicated hosts, and none of the companies allow me to sell shell accounts from them.
I'm sure it wasn't done on a whim. Giving out shell accounts allows the potential for serious abuse, and when you start granting strangers permission to do so many random things from the shell, abuse is destined to occur.
what he said, plus they have ssh access, either via a client or through a web-based client, and webmail. nice size of space available, too. you can also get a price of $100 per year if you pay up front. i got my panix acct. after netcom discontinued shell access, and my only regret is not getting it sooner.
stored on computers from birth to the grave
You provide support for a corporate entity with multiple access connections and have to regularly check to see which are up/down, and find out why.
You are an out of work, homeless, software developer, and the library won't let you compile software on one of their computers.
You happen to be interested in writing new software to spam the internet, but don't want direct evidence of it being your system sending it out. (not a legitimate reason, but it wouldn't surprise me if someone wanted to do just this. It's probably the primary reason you might find it hard to find a hosted shell account as well.)
You have a mail server set up at home, doing secure imap, which is the only hole in your firewall, and would like to read your mail at an Internet cafe, or public library, without having to put a copy of that pine config on every computer you touch.
Just some ideas.
-Rusty
You never know...
This, ultimately, is probably the major reason supported, open, free shell accounts have died out. Most people who'd want one have the ability to create what they need. As a result, the bulk of users of the free services have become those who are desperate to use someone else's machine, and you can imagine that a high proportion of those are script kiddies and other undesirables.
So I think the GP was on the money. Of course, you're out of luck if you don't have a DSL connection (or something else you can use to stay on the net permanently.)
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
Go to www.linode.com and get yourself a linode machine. Full root access and everything. All for about $20 a month. Good for hosting, backup, and shell stuff.