WinSCP is one of the easiest way to get information (logs) from the ESXi hosts and vCenter Server Appliance (VCSA).
You can download it here.
Which is the problem?
When you try to establish a connection to the VCSA 6.7 using WinSCP Client, I got the following error: “Host is not communicating for more than 15 seconds. Still waiting…”
And if you abor the process I got: “Error skipping startup messages. Your shell is probably incompatible with the application (BASH is recommended).”
Solution:
You have to enable Bash shell on the appliance. By default cannot be use to access remotely with WinSCP.
There are two workarounds to solve the issue.
Solution one:
- Using WinSCP open it and create e new session.
- At the login session window click Advanced
- On SFTP server input: shell /usr/libexec/sftp-server
- Connecto using SFTP protocol and you are in.
Solution two:
- Access the appliance (VCSA) on https://vcsa_ip:5480
- Navigate to Access and click Edit under Access Settings.
- Switch on Enable SSH Login and click OK.
- Access VCSA with SSH and type Shell
- Change the default Shell to Bash typing: chsh -s /bin/bash root
After that you can access VCSA with WinSCP