Question

I feel like a complete dunce – but I cannot seem to connect with Terminal.app and SSH to a non-standard SSH port. I’m on Mountain Lion.

I’ve tried all of the following:

$ ssh [e-mail] -p 42586
$ ssh [e-mail] -p42586
$ ssh -p 42586 [e-mail]
$ ssh -p42586 [e-mail]

I cannot seem to get the syntax right, all of the above produce an error. What is the correct order of flags? I have checked the man page and it shows it as preceding the [user]@[domain] section, however, this throws an error as well.

Edit:

More information and raw terminal output:

$ ssh mysite.com -p42586
--hangs--
$ ssh mysite.com -p 42586
--hangs--
$ ssh -p42586 mysite.com
usage: grep [-abcDEFGHhIiJLlmnOoPqRSsUVvwxZ] [-A num] [-B num] [-C[num]]
    [-e pattern] [-f file] [--binary-files=value] [--color=when]
    [--context[=num]] [--directories=action] [--label] [--line-buffered]
    [--null] [pattern] [file ...]
usage: ssh [-1246AaCfgKkMNnqsTtVvXxYy] [-b bind_address] [-c cipher_spec]
           [-D [bind_address:]port] [-e escape_char] [-F configfile]
           [-I pkcs11] [-i identity_file]
           [-L [bind_address:]port:host:hostport]
           [-l login_name] [-m mac_spec] [-O ctl_cmd] [-o option] [-p port]
           [-R [bind_address:]port:host:hostport] [-S ctl_path]
           [-W host:port] [-w local_tun[:remote_tun]]
           [user@]hostname [command]
$ ssh -p 42586 mysite.com
usage: grep [-abcDEFGHhIiJLlmnOoPqRSsUVvwxZ] [-A num] [-B num] [-C[num]]
    [-e pattern] [-f file] [--binary-files=value] [--color=when]
    [--context[=num]] [--directories=action] [--label] [--line-buffered]
    [--null] [pattern] [file ...]
/usr/bin/ssh: option requires an argument -- p
usage: ssh [-1246AaCfgKkMNnqsTtVvXxYy] [-b bind_address] [-c cipher_spec]
           [-D [bind_address:]port] [-e escape_char] [-F configfile]
           [-I pkcs11] [-i identity_file]
           [-L [bind_address:]port:host:hostport]
           [-l login_name] [-m mac_spec] [-O ctl_cmd] [-o option] [-p port]
           [-R [bind_address:]port:host:hostport] [-S ctl_path]
           [-W host:port] [-w local_tun[:remote_tun]]
           [user@]hostname [command]

Examples 1 and 2 hang until timeout. 3 and 4 produce a grep usage echo as well as an ssh usage echo.

Edit 2:

Thanks for the suggestion @topguncoder my original attempt was the colon notation – but that produces a different error:

$ ssh [e-mail]:42586
ssh: Could not resolve hostname mysite:42586: nodename nor servname provided, or not known

Answer 1

Try

"ssh" -p 42586 mysite.com

to ignore your alias settings. It looks like you might have ssh aliased to something else. If this works, you should check your .profile for any ssh aliases.