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Remote SSH

SSH (Secure SHell) is a protocol that can be used for remote access to Unix and Linux workstations.

Note on running graphical programs remotely:

SSH is often used for text-based access to the remote hosts, however it is possible to run most graphical (X-Windows) applications remotely as well. This requires X-Windows software on your computer as well as a very fast internet connection. From on campus, this is a viable option. For many other situations where a graphical environment is needed, a VNC session might be a better choice. (Depending on the situation, this may use SSH underneath.)

Usage:

If you are connecting from a linux computer, the usage is simply:

ssh -Y user@host

Here user is your CAE username, and host is the remote host you want to connect to.

CAE linux lab machines as tux-N.cae.wisc.edu, where N is the machine number. use best-tux.cae.wisc.edu to find an idle available linux workstation.

The -Y flag is optional and indicates that X-Windows applications should be forwarded over the connection, if possible. This is the default behavior when connecting from a CAE lab unix machine.

Other platforms:

Mac OS X:

ssh support is built-into the operating system. First launch the Terminal application (located in the Applications/Utilities folder). From there you can invoke ssh as above.

X-Windows support: Newer versions of OS X ship with the Apple implementation of X-Windows. This is included on the installation media, but might not be installed by default. If it is installed, you'll find a X11 application in the Applications/Utilities folder. When you launch this, you'll get a terminal window from which you can run ssh using the -Y flag above. Most graphical programs will display back to your Mac when used in this way.

Windows:

Windows does not come with a ssh client, so you'll have to download and install one.

Two of the options are:

  • The free PuTTY client. There is no installation routine for PuTTY as the entire program consists of the file "PuTTY.exe".
  • Alternatively, the UW-licensed SecureCRT

Either way, when you configure the ssh session, enter the hostname of a CAE lab computer, and select SSH as the protocol (SSH2 in the case of SecureCRT).

X-Windows support: If you are connecting from a campus computer, you can install the UW-licensed X-Win32. Other free alternatives include Xming and Cygwin/X. Installing and configuring these is beyond the scope of this document.