How to Access Linux Server Terminal in Web Browser Using ‘Wetty (Web + tty)’ Tool

Running Wetty at System Start Up

To run Wetty automatically at next system boot, let’s add a line to root’s crontab as follows:

# crontab -e

@reboot /usr/bin/node /root/wetty/app.js --sslkey /root/wetty/key.pem --sslcert /root/wetty/cert.pem -p 8080 > /dev/null 2>&1

Let’s now restart the system and check whether Wetty starts automatically afterwards:

As you can see, Wetty is up and running, and you start monitoring your servers using your browser anytime.

Run Wetty in a Domain or Subdomain

If you want to hide the port number in the web browser’s address bar or want to run Wetty in a domain or subdomain, you can run Wetty behind Nginx, the well-known proxy server.

This will allow you to open the web user interface without specifying the port number where Wetty is running.

To do that, first create the SSL certificates for Nginx:

# mkdir /etc/nginx/ssl
# openssl req -x509 -nodes -days 365 -newkey rsa:2048 -keyout /etc/nginx/ssl/nginx.key -out /etc/nginx/ssl/nginx.crt 

Then add the following directives in /etc/nginx/sites-available/default:

# Default server configuration
#
        server {
        listen 80 default_server;
        return 301 https://$http_host$request_uri$is_args$query_string;
    }

server {
    listen 443 ssl;

    root /usr/share/nginx/html;
    index index.html index.htm;
# Replace localhost with domain or subdomain name (if desired)
    server_name localhost;
    ssl_certificate /etc/nginx/ssl/nginx.crt;
    ssl_certificate_key /etc/nginx/ssl/nginx.key;

location /wetty {
    proxy_pass http://127.0.0.1:8080/wetty;
    proxy_http_version 1.1;
    proxy_set_header Upgrade $http_upgrade;
    proxy_set_header Connection "upgrade";
    proxy_read_timeout 43200000;

    proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
    proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
    proxy_set_header Host $http_host;
    proxy_set_header X-NginX-Proxy true;
    }
}

Then restart Nginx:

# systemctl restart nginx

and launch Wetty as follows:

# node /root/wetty/app.js -p 8080 &

Note: That in the above command we are not using the original self-signed certificate and key (cert.pem and key.pem) since we already added specific SSL certificates to Nginx (nginx.crt and nginx.key).

Finally, point your browser to http://<domain name>/wetty and Nginx will take care of securing the connection via HTTPS automatically for you.

Unfortunately, Wetty has not been optimized for systemd yet. Thus, in order to run Wetty in the background (you can think of this workaround as having the program run as a daemon) permanently, remove the SSL options from the crontab entry mentioned earlier:

@reboot /usr/bin/node /root/wetty/app.js -p 8080 > /dev/null 2>&1

Since the only configuration that can be edited is the listening port, you will need to kill the process, change the port value, and start the process again:

# node /root/wetty/app.js -p 8080 &

Summary

In this article we have explained how to install and configure Wetty, a tool that was designed to provide terminal access within a web browser window, in Fedora and Debian-based distributions. You will come to love this tool as it will allow you to connect to remote servers, execute commands, and run programs in them without leaving your browser.

We would love to hear what you think of this program. Does it sound like something you would use in your daily work? Feel free to drop us a line using the form below. Questions and suggestions are also welcome.

Read Also:

1. Shell In A Box – A Web-Based SSH Terminal to Access Remote Linux Servers
2. PHP Shell – Provides Linux Shell Access in Web Browser