Access your server via SSH with Putty

| Mar 15, 2007 | Comments 16

This tutorial will show you how to access a remote computer using Putty.
Putty is very popular and powerful remote client for Raw, Telnet, Rlogin and SSH protocols.
Putty can be downloaded from Putty.nl

It is stand alone application so once downloaded it can be used without installation. Just start putty.exe and you will see the Putty configuration screen.
Server access with Putty

Put the IP of your server or a particular domain name pointed to it into ”Host Name (or IP address)” filed as it is shown above and set the ”Protocol” to be SSH.
Then expand the ”Category” section in left and then choose SSH.

Once it is opened set the ”Preferred SSH protocol version” to be ”2” and then go back to the first screen as clicking on ”Session” on the top.

server connaction with Putty

 

To have this session stored type a name in the ”Saved Sessions” field then ”Save”. From now on you will need only to click on the stored session name and this will open a window with the saved settings.

If you want to see if there are any error messages while using Putty, you can choose the ”Close window on exit” option to be ”Only on clean exit”.

When you are ready click on ”OK” to start the login to the server.

SSH to server Putty session

 

If  you are logging for a first time you will see a security alert:

Server fingerprint message

Click “Yes” and the next will be the log-in prompt where you should put your server credentials:

Once you logged in you can continue to use Putty for server management .

 

For example if you type

This will reboot the server

Tags

Filed Under: Putty

Anthony Gee About the Author: Anthony G. is an IT specialist with more than 9 years of solid working experience in the Web Hosting industry. Currently works as server support administrator, involved in consultative discussions about Web Hosting and server administration. One of the first writers in the Onlinehowto.net website, now writing for Free Tutorials community - he is publishing tutorials and articles for the wide public, as well as specific technical solutions.

Comments (16)

  1. Trich says:
    February 25, 2010 at 11:27 am

    How to restart server from putty to reboot?

    Reply
  2. Tony says:
    February 26, 2010 at 2:58 am

    Trich, just when you are logged in on the server type:

    shutdown -r now

    This command will reboot the server.

    Reply
  3. Rod says:
    April 17, 2011 at 7:25 pm

    how can I add:
    204.23.21.9 darma.com http://www.darma.com

    to my hosts file using console?

    Reply
  4. Tony says:
    April 18, 2011 at 7:56 am

    You can use ‘vi’, ‘nano’, or any other Linux editor. To edit the “hosts” file, type:

    vi /etc/hosts

    then add the line.
    Another simple way is just to send the text directly trough the console with:

    cat >> /etc/hosts
    hit and then in paste the line and press Ctrl+D twice. This will add the line to the end of the /etc/hosts file

    Reply
  5. Rod says:
    April 18, 2011 at 2:15 pm

    Thank you Tony for your answer. I read about the cat command and I am afraid I can mess something.
    Using VI I am not able to type inside the file, or if I copy-paste, the line starts without the first few symbols, and then I am not able to edit it. How can I use VI and start directly typing or pasting, and how I can save my work then?

    Reply
  6. Tony says:
    April 18, 2011 at 4:40 pm

    Hey Rod, check this section out for [url=http://www.freetutorialssubmit.com/Tutorials/VIM-editor/Common-VIM-editor-commands/228]vi commands[/url]

    Reply
  7. Rod says:
    April 18, 2011 at 4:44 pm

    yup, got it already.
    Thank you Tony

    Reply
  8. mrody says:
    August 29, 2011 at 6:13 am

    What is the command to add ssh user with putty?

    Reply
  9. Anthony Gee Free tutorials says:
    August 29, 2011 at 8:25 am

    To add new ssh user type in the console:

    useradd newuser

    Then to set password for this user type:

    passwd newuser

    By default adding user should create home folder which like:

    /home/newuser

    If there is no such folder (under Ubuntu Linux is happening very often) – check the passwd file whether the user exist and what should be the home folder with this command:

    grep newuser /etc/passwd
    newuser:x:1002:1003::/home/newuser:/bin/bash

    Reply
  10. ReksT says:
    September 30, 2011 at 10:40 am

    I was able to access my server with Putty.
    Thank you!

    Reply
  11. Anthony Gee Anthony Gee says:
    October 1, 2011 at 2:15 pm

    Probably you are logged as different user than root.
    try:
    sudo reboot
    or switch to root user if you have the password like:
    su – root
    and then reboot.

    Reply
  12. putty user says:
    October 7, 2011 at 3:10 am

    I am not able to reboot my server using putty. The message is : reboot: Need to be root

    Reply
  13. Archana says:
    January 5, 2013 at 11:49 am

    what is the password we have to give when we login the first time into putty

    Reply
  14. Archana says:
    January 6, 2013 at 5:33 am

    what is the password we have to type the first time we login??

    Reply

Leave a Reply