Interfacing with Biowulf using Putty

Putty is an open source and grpahical based ssh client that is also capable of scp and sftp. It is one of the ways to interface with Biowulf for Windows users. To obtin Putty, goto https://www.putty.org (Figure 1). At the Putty website, click on the Download Putty link (Figure 1).

Figure 1

Subsequently, we will be taken to a page that houses several download options. To avoid having to install anything, we can grab the ".exe" files under the "Alternative binary files" section (Figure 2). Make sure to get the 64-bit x86 versions. Download putty.exe (the ssh client), pscp.exe (for scp), and psftp.exe (for sftp).

Figure 2

In this example, I have downloaded putty.exe, pscp.exe, and psftp.exe onto the Windows desktop.

Figure 3

To connect to Biowulf, open putty and in the dialogue box that appears, enter biowulf.nih.gov in the box labeled "Host Name (or IP address), make sure the "Port" is set to 22, and that we choose SSH as the "Connection type". See Figure 4. Once the information has been entered, hit "Open".

Figure 4

We will then be taken to a terminal where we entering our login credentials (Figur 5 and Figure 6)

Figure 5

Figure 6

We will reach the Biowulf prompt after successfully logging in (Figure 7).

Figure 7

If we open a Windows Command Prompt, and change into the directory where pscp.exe was downloaded (in this case O:\Users\wuz8\Desktop), we can transfer files from Biowulf to our local machine using the Putty version of scp, which is pscp (Figure 8).

Figure 8