I am a Linux novice. I use it to do very simple things.

I have RH 7.2

I am having problems Telnet-ing and ftp-ing into the machine. I have been working on fixing this for WEEKS. Both refuse connections. Both of them used to work and then stopped working at the same time. That was months ago so I can't pin down what changed around the time that they stopped working. About all I know is that I rebooted one day and they didn't' work after that. I update packages on a regular basis using the RHN and maybe installing one of those broke it. I have also upgraded kernels periodicly through RHN.

For now, I am concentrating on getting telnet up and working since I think the ftp problem is the same.

When I try to telnet into the machine or do a "telnet localhost" I get "connection refused".
I have verified that the telnet service is running.
I have verified that the telnet configuration file is set to disabled=no.
I have verified that my hosts.deny is empty
I have verified that my hosts.allow file has "telnet: LOCAL"
<be aware that I only vaguely understand this stuff. I am just going on what I have read from other posts on this same problem>

Other things I have tried based on suggestions from others posts:
/etc/rc.d/init.d/ipchains stop (tells me that IPChains is not compatible with this kernel)
/etc/rc.d/init.d/iptables stop (this works; doesn't solve problem)
ipchains -F(this works too; doesn't solve problem)

Other post have said to check /var/log/secure and /var/log/messages
I tried those. They tell me I don't have permissions. I was logged in as root. You tell me, but something seems wrong if I am root and don't have permissions. Is something majorly screwy with my machine?

I have also heard that ssh is better (yes, I understand why) and that it is separate from xinetd so it would configure totaly separate. Should I be concentrating on getting ssh working instead? Is it perhaps easier to get working than telnet? I figured that if I get telnet working, I have lots of time (free time at work, not at home) to work on installing and configuring other stuff.

P.S. My machine is at home and I am writing this from work. So any responses from me will be the next day if I have to check something on the machine.

Please help if you are able. Im stumped.

You're probably running Xinetd. There is a directory under /etc it is /etc/xinted.d. Look in /etc/xinetd.d for a file called telnet. Check that file to see if there are any restrictions on it or if anything says 'disabled'. If this is confusing to you then just copy and paste the file into this thread so we can see what it says.

Thanks for the reply. No, I understand what you are talking about. I can't get at the exact file right now but I KNOW it has Disabled=no in it. So telnet is not disabled from there. Besides, telnet used to work. It just stopped working one day and I had not edited any files.

May I suggest using SSH instead of telnet. Telnet is not encrypted and SSH is. Any fool can eavesdrop on your sessions and pick up user names and passwords if you allow telnet access.

I am currently looking into ssh. But I can't find anything on how to configure it. I have all the rpms installed already. I just need to know how to configure it. It must need something. I tried to connect (using Putty) and it give me connection refused. Same old theme.

openssh.org

I was able to get ssh working w/o too much trouble. Thanks for your help.
I have to manuly start it after I start the machine and then it works. I don't understand that as it shows as being in the startup from my KDE service viewer.

What else do I need to do to make it start at bootup?

Make sure there's a link from /etc/rc.d/rc(a).d/S(b)sshd to /etc/rc.d/init.d/sshd where (a) is the runlevel you start it in and (b) is the place in the startup sequence you want to start it as (after networking ok, else it doesn't make sense). Try "chkconfig --list sshd" to see if it'll be started in the runlevel you want, else try "chkconfig --level <yourLevel> sshd on". "man chkconfig" for more.