Editing Enabling SSH Connections to an Elastic Beanstalk Environment (section)

== Configuration ==

<div class="alert alert-info">I had a hell of a time getting this to work using an existing EC2 instance. I ended up rebuilding the Key Pair, IAM Role, and EC2 instance. Then and only then did this work... actually come to think of it, I suspect that the problem might have been in the configuration of the EC2 instance. Where the directions say to select '''Enable''' for the '''Auto-assign Public IP''', initially I left it at the default setting. I can't see a way of going back and changing this setting once the instance is created. </div>

When a Key Pair is created through the AWS management console, a `.pem` file containing the pair is generated. 

This file is created once, and cannot be generated again at a later date. 

Save the `.pem` file locally, e.g. in `~/.ssh/` or `c:\users\damien\.ssh\`. 

On Mac OS use ssh via the terminal.

The AWS documentation stresses using PuTTY on Windows, but it's possible to use a Powershell prompt also. Maybe the Powershell prompt isn't as secure? 

PuTTY uses a `.ppk` file to hold the key pair, while the Powershell prompt uses the `.pem` file. 

=== Prerequisites ===

* A running EC2 instance
** [https://console.aws.amazon.com/ec2/ EC2 dashboard]
** '''Navigation''' pane > '''Instances''' > '''Instances'''
*** Confirm that the EC2 instance exists, and that it is running.
*** Retrieve the '''public DNS''' for the EC2 instance from this page.