Ask just about any *NIX admin using a Windows laptop and they will have come across Putty. For years, Apple MacBooks have been the go-to choice for many admins partly because getting to a ssh shell is so easy. The newly re-invigorated Microsoft is changing how easy it is to interface with Linux (and other *NIX flavors) significantly with features like Ubuntu on Windows. There is a new beta feature in Windows 10 that may just see the retirement of Putty from many users: an OpenSSH client and OpenSSH server application for Windows.
Meh, Babun (https://babun.github.io/) gets you the full Cygwin stack with OpenSSH and whatever floats your *nix boat on all Windows versions.
Babun (and Cygwin itself) is awesome, but if your just wanting to log into a few Linux machines now and then its a bit much imo…
This is like a 650KB instant install and it so far just works. Its like putty but without all the putty idiosyncrasies. Thumbs up.
For that use case, I suggest MobaXterm. ssh, sftp, X11 forwarding, and a number of useful tools like ssh tunnels, portscanner, network scanner, packet capture, and tetris, all in a tabbed framework.
Available in both installable and portable (ie, non-admin) versions.
I think its days are numbered. Linux for windows is getting better all the time.
One of the nicer things about PuTTY and KiTTY (improved version of PuTTY) is the terminal emulator they come with. While a native SSH client may be handy in Windows, it will depend on how far cmd.exe has come as a terminal.
What’s the copy/paste setup using the mouse like these days? Can it be maximised to take up the entire screen? Does it support a customisable scrollback buffer, or is it still limited to 100-odd lines? What’s the colour support like? Are there tabs or split-screen support? Etc …
Note: I haven’t used cmd.exe in Windows 10 yet. I know there’s been some improvements, but I don’t know it’s a match for the PuTTY terminal.
Edited 2017-12-12 23:43 UTC
No…
Maybe that is next? If they added tabs and the ability to hotkey it as a overlay I’d be 100% happy with it to be honest, but I don’t live in it so something like Console or ConEmu might still suite more demanding users better.
Also, this might be helpful if your interested (full breakdown of all the newish key combos and whatnot):
https://technet.microsoft.com/library/mt427362.aspx
Edited 2017-12-13 00:14 UTC
Yes, but does it actually cover the entirety of the monitor screen? In Windows 7 (last one I’ve used), cmd.exe would only maximise vertically, taking up only about 30% of the horizontal screen.
Yes, entire screen. You just get the stupid scrollbar, which I guess is useful but its distracting… There is more than likely a hack to hide it though, it just hasn’t bothered me enough to go looking.
ps. Microsoft needs to add an option for replacing all scrollbars with an overlay that only appears during scroll (like OSX does). That would make me very very happy.
Edited 2017-12-13 00:17 UTC
Scrollbar? Of course you always have a vertical scrollbar in a terminal (and no horizontal)? Can you dynamically resize the window with dynamic line wrap? Is there a right click context menu option for “open url under cursor in browser”? Is there a quake like shell mode? (I use the scroll lock key to open a quake like shell.)
All was mentioned before and all of this are the minimum feature set of a terminal for me.
Its not there yet, but its getting there. For now there is always Console or ConEmu if you want a custom terminal. Both of them do most of this stuff, there are just overly complicated imo. Im lazy and just want a few more tweaks and Ill be happy.
Edited 2017-12-13 00:35 UTC
If cmd.exe doesn’t float your boat, you can always try PowerShell. It’s more powerful (built in scripting via cmdlets, and supports pipes) and pretty much anything you’d want to run in cmd.exe runs in it, including ssh.
Also, for those who read the article and followed the installation instructions only to find typing “ssh” doesn’t work right away, you have to reboot Windows to complete the installation. Yep, some things never change.
“you have to reboot Windows to complete the installation. Yep, some things never change.”
LOL, amazing.
My guess is there is an other way, probably something less intrusive could be done.
Maybe, but simply logging out and back in didn’t work. It could be because it’s a beta feature and I don’t run the insider version; when I rebooted it gave me messages about installing updates that looked a lot like when I was testing insider builds on another machine a while back. Maybe for insider builds it doesn’t require any low level changes to enable the feature because the support structure is already there.
Yeah, who knows, it was still funny though.
I had a good laugh. 🙂
Windows, Windows never changes…
The bigger question is whether or not Microsoft has implemented a proper PsuedoTTY (pty) device. The Console Device used for cmd.exe, COMMAAND.COM, and PowerShell isn’t a proper PTY device, and thus a lot of the tools, etc available on Linux, Mac, and other UNIXes devices are simply not possible.
KDE ported most of their stuff over; but Konsole can’t b/c of the lack of a PTY device. Same goes for Xterm, GNOME Terminal, etc.
Very informative. I was wondering why those apps hadn’t been ported over. Was guessing just lack of dev time.
What matters here is proper ANSI color code support, not how you change the color theme. I (and most sensible admins) don’t care about how you change the color scheme as long as it’s possible, with the caveat that it has to work with the ANSI escape codes programs from anything except windows use.
Last I checked, there technically is ANSI terminal emulation support, but it’s mediocre at best.
Also, slightly OT, but bash is not in any way responsible for the color scheme on Linux, either the kernel (if you’re using a regular virtual terminal) or the terminal emulator (if you’re using a terminal window in a graphical environment) is.
Yup, PuTTY is a pretty well polished terminal emulator. I use it for serial port attached stuff on Linux, instead of the horrible minicom.
On Linux it’s literally just a Gtk config menu that calls an xterm.
Change that to:
First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they try to sabotage you, then they fight you, then they join you and then you win…
Its the beginning of the end, lets see what wayland when fully integrated provides. As it stands come back to me, when they manage to pull this off:
https://ibb.co/dOphpm
KDE is a thing of beauty, it has both form and function …
Is it possible that the article mix the protocol SSH, with the software OpenSSH?
My understanding was that OpenSSH is a SSH client-server software made by pleople from OpenBSD.
No, its not an error – the SSH client/server IS OpenSSH (yes, the one made by the OpenBSD people)…
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/powershell/2015/06/03/looking-forwa…
I’m sure its modified some, but it is definitely derived from the real thing.
It is OpenSSH built to use Microsoft’s encryption libraries instead of OpenSSL, which, in itself, is a very GOOD thing. OpenSSL is a horrid mess. Even Google abandoned it and forked BoringSSL.
Nice idea, but only supports AES-CTR and chacha20 ciphers and supports a tiny subset of keys and KEXs, but, on the other hand, a decent set of MACs.
It also says that it doesn’t use the OpenSSL library. That’s the really big news, here.
I understand leaving out arcfour/RC4 and IDEA, but why wouldn’t MSFT include Blowfish, Twofish, CAST, and 3DES? At least they chose the CTR versions of these ciphers. (Blowfish isn’t compromised in any practical way, by the way). I prefer faster and less memory- and CPU-intensive ciphers.
Still, it’s a good start. The SSH server is compelling enough to check out especially since I just started using X2GO for remote desktop access which requires an SSH server for its file sharing feature.
Also, PuTTY isn’t going anywhere. This uses the Windows console for terminal emulation, so it’s not going to be adequate for many uses like full-screen editors.
At least it will bring attention to the quality of the ANSI mode terminal emulation. Back in the old days we had to deal with ANSI.SYS but now it’s integrated with the console.