Mac OS X
Note – Mountain Lion requires XQuartz to be installed in order to use X11 (see: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5293)
Go to Applications then Utilities and open the Terminal application.
Enter the following command to connect to a remote server. Here we are connecting to deneb.math.ualberta.ca. To connect to another server, just change the server name to the one you want (see: Connecting to Servers for a list). Change username to your own username that is used on the server.
| ssh -Y deneb.math.ualberta.ca -l username |
Enter your password when prompted and press enter. You should then see the server prompt and can run commands on the server.
Windows
To use X11 under windows, software such as Xming must be installed (see http://www.straightrunning.com/XmingNotes/#head-121 )
You can use PuTTy to connect to the servers. Download the installer: putty-0.62-installer.exe
After installing, open PuTTy from the ‘Start Menu -> Programs -> PuTTy’ and enter the following in the Host Name field. In this example, we will connect to deneb.math.ualberta.ca (see: Connecting to Servers for a list)
Then click the little ‘+’ box next to the SSH Category on the left and select X11, then check the Enable X11 forwarding check box.
Go back to the Session Category and save the session settings by entering a name in the Saved Sessions field and clicking the Save button.
Finally, click Open to connect to the server. You will be prompted for your username and password. Nothing is displayed when you enter the password, this is normal behaviour, just press enter after entering your password.
You should then see the server prompt and can run commands on the server.
There are many different Desktop Environments for Linux and Unix so it is not possible to cover all terminal locations here. However the terminal application should be easy to find in the Applications menu or by searching for it. Below are examples from Ubuntu.
In Ubuntu Unity, click the logo and search for terminal:
In the Gnome environment, use the Applications menu:
Once the terminal is open, enter the following command to connect to a remote server. Here we are connecting to deneb.math.ualberta.ca. To connect to another server, just change the server name to the one you want (see: Connecting to Servers for a list). Change username to your own username that is used on the server.
| ssh -Y deneb.math.ualberta.ca -l username |
Enter your password when prompted and press enter. You should then see the server prompt and can run commands on the server.