CJB.NET offers free shell accounts on our dedicated shell server

CJB.NET offers free shell accounts on our dedicated shell server. Our shell accounts include access to compilers, many common shells and scripting languages, system utilities, and more than 10,000 software packages to install.

Account Information

How do I sign up?

Click here to sign up.

How do I log into my account?

Connect via SSHv2 to shell.cjb.net on TCP port 22 or 443. Log in using your username and password. If you do not have an SSH client installed, we suggest using PuTTY.

Can I use public key authentication to log in?

Yes, public key authentication is supported.

How do I download or upload files?

You may transfer files using SCP, SFTP, or the server's command line utilities.

How do I change my e-mail address, password, or shell? How do I remove my account?

Click here to modify your account settings or remove your account.

Will my account expire if I don't log into my shell?

You must log into your shell within the first 7 days and at least once every 90 days thereafter.

I locked myself out of my account or broke it in some other way.

Click here and select the option to reset your account. This will remove and recreate it as a new account.

I forgot my password.

Click here to retrieve your password.

Software

What commands and software are available?

All shell accounts include access to the FreeBSD binaries and libraries, compilers, scripting languages (Perl/PHP/Python/Ruby/Tcl), editors (emacs/nano/pico/vi/vim), shells (bash/csh/sh/tcsh), Lynx, wget, and other utilities, and more than 10,000 software packages to install in your home directory.

How do I install a software package?

Enter the command you want to use at the prompt. If it is available in a package, installation instructions will be provided. Otherwise, you may need to compile and install from source.

A package I installed didn't work.

Packages are a quick and easy way to install basic commands. Unfortunately, some packages have hard coded system paths or other dependencies which prevents them from working when installed this way. In these cases, you may need to compile and install from source.

How do I list the packages I have installed or remove a package?

Type 'installedhome' at the prompt to list the packages you have installed and how to remove them.

What operating system do you use and what are the server specifications?

Our shell server runs the FreeBSD 9.0 amd64 operating system on an Intel quad core 3 GHz processor with 16GB of RAM and 1TB of disk space.

Restrictions

What restrictions apply to shell accounts on your server?

Each account may use up to 1GB of disk space, store up to 100,000 files, and run up to 16 processes at the same time. Each process is restricted to 128MB of RAM and one hour of CPU time. There is a limit of two SSH connections per IP address.

Are outgoing connections allowed? Are incoming connections allowed?

Outgoing TCP connections are allowed and are proxied through the Tor network. All other traffic is prohibited by our firewall.

Can I use my shell account to SSH forward/proxy/tunnel my Internet traffic?

Yes, we allow TCP forwarding through SSH. Your traffic will exit through the Tor network.

Can I run background processes or daemons? Can I setup a crontab or use screen?

You may run background processes and daemons and leave them running after you log out, but you must use daemon <command> to run them detached from the controlling terminal or they will be killed when you log out. We do not offer access to crontab or screen. Server daemons that listen for incoming connections will not work since incoming traffic is prohibited by our firewall.

Can I host a web site or use e-mail on your server?

Our shell server does not include a web server or a mail server. Please refer to our main web site for web hosting or e-mail services. You may use a command line mail client on our server to access a third party e-mail account, but we do not offer outgoing SMTP access.

I'm having trouble downloading from FTP servers.

Some FTP servers do not work when accessed through the Tor network. In these cases, you will need to transfer files using another method such as HTTP, SCP, or SFTP.

How is resource consumption managed and how do you deal with abuse?

The server enforces the above restrictions by hard limiting usage or killing processes which exceed the limits. Processes requiring a lot of CPU time are gradually deprioritized. We reserve the right to remove any account that uses an excessive or disproportionate amount of system resources or engages in abusive or illegal activity or behavior.