Installing “Secure Shell2 (SSH2)” PHP Extension

Installing the libssh2 and Secure Shell2 libraries is a real pain in the ass, but I have to do it time to time, when I’m setting up new environments for the software I work on.

Before we begin, please note this is on a CentOS machine with the yum package manager install.

Note: Before you begin, make sure you have all the proper developer packages installed.

yum install gcc gcc-c++ autoconf automake (c compiler)
yum install php-devel (phpize)

Installing OpenSSL on CentOS 5.2

• Run the following two yum commands to install OpenSSL & it’s developer’s package. (libssh2 has dependencies on the OpenSSL developer package)
• yum install openssl
• yum install openssl-devel

Installing libssh2 libraries on CentOS 5.2

• Enter the following commands to download and install the latest libssh2 package.
• wget http://voxel.dl.sourceforge.net/sourceforge/libssh2/libssh2-0.18.tar.gz
• gunzip libssh2-0.18.tar.gz
• tar -xvf libssh2-0.18.tar.gz
• cd libssh2-0.18.tar.gz
• ./configure && make all install

Compiling libssh2 PHP Extension

• Use these commands to download and compile the libssh2 PHP module.
• wget http://pecl.php.net/get/ssh2-0.10.tgz
• gunzip ssh2-0.10.tgz
• tar -xvf ssh2-0.10.tgz
• cd ssh2-0.10.tgz
• phpize && ./configure –with-ssh2 && make « Generates ssh2.so, the compiled PHP extension.
• (Note: If you encounter a make: *** [ssh2.lo] Error 1 error, run Bill Pitz’s libssh2 patch.)
• cp ./modules/ssh2.so /usr/lib/php/modules/ssh2.so
• Open your PHP configuration file by typing vi /etc/php.ini and add extension=ssh2.so to the configuration, and save the file when you are complete.

Restart Web Server on CentOS 5.2

• service httpd restart

You should be all gravy, and your web server can now ssh out and perform remote tasks for you!