Cannot SSH to a compute engine VM with IAP-Desktop about iap-desktop

[jpassing]

The attached log file indicates that...

• the VM uses metadata-based keys (as opposed to OS Login)
• there is an existing ecdsa-sha2-nistp384 key for the respective user in project or instance metadata

... but authenticating using that key failed.

It would be useful to take a look at the VM's SSHD logs (/var/log/secure or auth.log, depending on your guest OS). The log should indicate whether authentication failed because of a public key mismatch or because of some other reason.

If it's a public key mismatch, you can let the affected user try the following:

1. Go to Tools > Options > SSH
2. Switch to a different key type (such as NISTP-521). That causes IAP Desktop to create and upload a new key.
3. Try connecting again.

Alternatively, you can use the Authorized SSH keys window to find and delete the user's existing public key. This causes IAP Desktop to re-upload its key the next time the user connects.

If the error is account-related, try changing the user's connection settings so that it uses the same username as putty:

1. Right-click the VM in the Project Explorer window and select Connection settings.
2. Set Username to the username they use in putty. This ensures that IAP Desktop uses the same Linux user as putty.

[jpassing]

As I haven't heard back, I assume that this is resolved? If not, please re-open the issue.