[Solved] Port forwarding shenanigans | Arch Linux Community | Page 1

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:20 AM

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M'kay. So. I have an extremely weird usecase for SSH right around here.

My friends play an overly techy minecraft modpack, and they have a server in their virtual LAN. The client for their virtual LAN is not available for Linux, and trying to forward a connection through a Windows VM would be... actually the same as what I want to do here, theory-wise.

So. I have a laptop with Linux, a server which can be accessed from the outer internet, and a friend who has OpenSSH on his Windows computer and is willing to do some magic.

Lets say I forward an SSH port from my laptop to my server, allowing inbound SSH access to the laptop by accessing my server's IP. What kind of shenanigans should my friend pull to pass TCP packets between their "server" and my server, utilizing OpenSSH? Preferably with as little configuration as possible on the friend's end.

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:25 AM

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sly pendant M'kay. So. I have an extremely weird usecase for SSH right around here. My frie...

wouldnt this be easier to use with something such as tailscale

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just forward it to your tailnet and access it

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:26 AM

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it would, but i cba to connect ALL OF THEM, or their server, to my tailnet

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:26 AM

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from the laptop

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:26 AM

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sly pendant it would, but i cba to connect ALL OF THEM, or their server, to my tailnet

?

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:26 AM

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i mean. that would require more than zero set up and also the tailscale download repo is sometimes not available in russia

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:27 AM

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sly pendant i mean. that would require more than zero set up and also the tailscale download...

only you would have to set it up on the laptop

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:27 AM

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which means they will probably not be able to install the tailscale client

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:27 AM

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ivory depot only you would have to set it up on the laptop

i have tailscale, they dont

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:27 AM

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tailscale has a feature where you can forward ports on the local net to a tailnet

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:28 AM

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sly pendant i have tailscale, they dont

... its your laptop

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:28 AM

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yeah

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:28 AM

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so..?

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whats the issue lol

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:28 AM

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and the minecraft server im trying to connect to is not in my tailnet or my lan

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hold on imma draw this rq

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this is the current state of the system

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what i wanna do is this

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i already can port forward arbitrary shit to outlander and back, all i need is a minimal-configuration way for friend 2 to forward a port from their server to outlander using openssh

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why openssh? because windows 10 comes with it, so noone has to install it

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why minimal config? because this will be reused with different independent groups of friends

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:34 AM

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its shrimple

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:34 AM

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absolutely it is, except

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this. is my laptop

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:35 AM

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sly pendant this. is my laptop

all devices in a tailnet can talk to one another

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:35 AM

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I FUCKING KNOW

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THE POINT IS

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THEY ARE NOT ON MY TAILNET

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AND I CANT JOIN THEIR VIRTUAL LAN

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:35 AM

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...

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so youre saying thickie isnt always a part of the tailnet or

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im kinda confused here

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:36 AM

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im saying thickie is absolutely always a part of the tailnet

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look closely at the image

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:36 AM

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yes i know

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:36 AM

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the minecraft server is not a part of the tailnet

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:37 AM

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your laptop will forward ports from the vlan into your tailnet

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you said the laptop would have access to both the vlan and outside internet right

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:37 AM

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i never said that

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indeed i did say the exact opposite, like three times by now, and explicitly specified it in the image

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MY LAPTOP. CAN NOT. JOIN. THEIR FUCKING. VIRTUAL LAN.

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:38 AM

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sly pendant i never said that

oh wait i misunderstood

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i thought you meant the laptop would be permenantly attached to the vlan

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:38 AM

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i have a friend who is willing to forward ports using openssh

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:38 AM

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my apologies

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:39 AM

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ivory depot i thought you meant the laptop would be permenantly attached to the vlan

i would absolutely go this route if the vlan software of their choice wasn't proprietary windows-only piece of shit that cant be selfhosted or installed on linux

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and getting a windows pc into my tailnet and setting up their vlan on there still leaves me with the issue of having to forward ports from the server to my laptop, which brings me back to the start of this conversation

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how exactly do i do that

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:41 AM

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i suppose this is the simple way

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:42 AM

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sly pendant what i wanna do is this

that is exactly what i've shown here

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glad we're on the same page now

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:42 AM

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oki

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so i have no clue how to do port forwarding over ssh

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but after that it should be simple to forward them into the tailnet

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:43 AM

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ivory depot so i have no clue how to do port forwarding over ssh

thanks for trying to help i guess, that is the one part that i have trouble with

elder socketBOT Feb 14, 2026, 5:43 AM

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/usr/lib/electron38/electron received a thank you cookie!

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:44 AM

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and sorry for yelling

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:45 AM

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i mean according to this it looks fairly simple

Linuxize

How to Set up SSH Tunneling (Port Forwarding)

Learn how to set up SSH tunneling (port forwarding) in Linux. This guide covers local, remote, and dynamic port forwarding with practical examples.

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assuming ip addresses and the like are all static

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:45 AM

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actually yeah, you did help, reversing the forwarding direction should do

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:46 AM

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yippee

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so from what i read on that article

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:46 AM

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what i've been trying to do previously is expose thickie to the outside and try to port forward to thickie, but exposing the minecraft server and just connecting to it should work better

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:46 AM

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basically once the ports are forwarded its as simple as exposing them to the tailnet

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:47 AM

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now i just gotta create a stub account on outlander that is only used for this, as my main account is using authkey only :D

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:48 AM

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yeah so after you forward it over ssh just do tailscale serve <lo forwarded addr> and it'll be up

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:49 AM

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sly pendant now i just gotta create a stub account on outlander that is only used for this, ...

i mean it shouldnt need sudo priveliges

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wait

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actually

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:49 AM

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as long as the port is not lower than 1024

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:50 AM

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sly pendant as long as the port is not lower than 1024

you need sudo to connect/disconnect tailscale as well

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hmm

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:50 AM

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outlander is always on the tailnet and it is always serving all of its ports

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its my goddamn vps

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its entire point is to serve

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:51 AM

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sly pendant outlander *is* always on the tailnet and it *is* always serving all of its ports

okie

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 5:51 AM

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its also conveniently the tailnet host, it runs headscale

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so

ivory depot Feb 14, 2026, 5:51 AM

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sly pendant its also conveniently the tailnet *host*, it runs headscale

that also kinda makes it a single point of failure

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but eh itll be fine

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not like this is an enterprise production deployment

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 6:04 AM

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yup, got the algo set up

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thanks again

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[Solved] Port forwarding shenanigans

shut bloom Feb 14, 2026, 4:56 PM

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sly pendant it would, but i cba to connect ALL OF THEM, or their server, to my tailnet

why not just use your swrver as a proxy and redirect all incoming traffic on a specific port to their?

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nvm. its solved. my bad

sly pendant Feb 14, 2026, 11:14 PM

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shut bloom why not just use your swrver as a proxy and redirect all incoming traffic on a s...

too much effort

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anyway

ssh -R 0.0.0.0:targetport:serverhost:serverport user@vps

this worked (target port is the one i connect on, serverhost and serverport are the host and port of the minecraft server)

#[Solved] Port forwarding shenanigans