Document telnet_keyboard more completely, cross-reference from "Special
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76d3d354 1\versionid $Id: using.but,v 1.32 2004/09/22 22:15:25 jacob Exp $
fc5a8711 2
3\C{using} Using PuTTY
4
5This chapter provides a general introduction to some more advanced
6features of PuTTY. For extreme detail and reference purposes,
7\k{config} is likely to contain more information.
8
9\H{using-session} During your session
10
11A lot of PuTTY's complexity and features are in the configuration
12panel. Once you have worked your way through that and started
13a session, things should be reasonably simple after that.
14Nevertheless, there are a few more useful features available.
15
16\S{using-selection} Copying and pasting text
17
6cc170f0 18\I{copy and paste}Often in a PuTTY session you will find text on
19your terminal screen which you want to type in again. Like most
20other terminal emulators, PuTTY allows you to copy and paste the
21text rather than having to type it again. Also, copy and paste uses
22the \I{Windows clipboard}Windows \i{clipboard}, so that you can
23paste (for example) URLs into a web browser, or paste from a word
24processor or spreadsheet into your terminal session.
25
26PuTTY's copy and paste works entirely with the \i{mouse}. In order
27to copy text to the clipboard, you just click the \i{left mouse
28button} in the terminal window, and drag to \I{selecting text}select
29text. When you let go of the button, the text is \e{automatically}
30copied to the clipboard. You do not need to press Ctrl-C or
31Ctrl-Ins; in fact, if you do press Ctrl-C, PuTTY will send a Ctrl-C
32character down your session to the server where it will probably
33cause a process to be interrupted.
fc5a8711 34
35Pasting is done using the right button (or the middle mouse button,
36if you have a three-button mouse and have set it up; see
6cc170f0 37\k{config-mouse}). (Pressing \i{Shift-Ins}, or selecting \q{Paste}
38from the Ctrl+right-click context menu, have the same effect.) When
39you click the \i{right mouse button}, PuTTY will read whatever is in
40the Windows clipboard and paste it into your session, \e{exactly} as
41if it had been typed at the keyboard. (Therefore, be careful of
42pasting formatted text into an editor that does automatic indenting;
43you may find that the spaces pasted from the clipboard plus the
44spaces added by the editor add up to too many spaces and ruin the
45formatting. There is nothing PuTTY can do about this.)
46
47If you \i{double-click} the left mouse button, PuTTY will select a
48whole word. If you double-click, hold down the second click, and
49drag the mouse, PuTTY will select a sequence of whole words. (You
50can adjust precisely what PuTTY considers to be part of a word; see
51\k{config-charclasses}.) If you \e{triple}-click, or
52\i{triple-click} and drag, then PuTTY will select a whole line or
53sequence of lines.
54
55If you want to select a \I{rectangular selection}rectangular region
56instead of selecting to the end of each line, you can do this by
57holding down Alt when you make your selection. (You can also
58configure rectangular selection to be the default, and then holding
59down Alt gives the normal behaviour instead. See
60\k{config-rectselect} for details.)
61
62If you have a \i{middle mouse button}, then you can use it to
63\I{adjusting a selection}adjust an existing selection if you
64selected something slightly wrong. (If you have configured the
65middle mouse button to paste, then the right mouse button does this
66instead.) Click the button on the screen, and you can pick up the
67nearest end of the selection and drag it to somewhere else.
fc5a8711 68
6cee219d 69It's possible for the server to ask to handle mouse clicks in the
70PuTTY window itself. If this happens, the mouse cursor will turn
25c22a0c 71into an arrow, and using the mouse to copy and paste will only work if
72you hold down Shift. See \k{config-features-mouse} and
73\k{config-mouseshift} for details of this feature and how to configure
74it.
6cee219d 75
6cc170f0 76\S{using-scrollback} \I{scrollback}Scrolling the screen back
fc5a8711 77
78PuTTY keeps track of text that has scrolled up off the top of the
79terminal. So if something appears on the screen that you want to
80read, but it scrolls too fast and it's gone by the time you try to
81look for it, you can use the scrollbar on the right side of the
6cc170f0 82window to look back up the session \i{history} and find it again.
fc5a8711 83
84As well as using the scrollbar, you can also page the scrollback up
6cc170f0 85and down by pressing \i{Shift-PgUp} and \i{Shift-PgDn}. You can
86scroll a line at a time using \i{Ctrl-PgUp} and \i{Ctrl-PgDn}. These
87are still available if you configure the scrollbar to be invisible.
fc5a8711 88
89By default the last 200 lines scrolled off the top are
90preserved for you to look at. You can increase (or decrease) this
91value using the configuration box; see \k{config-scrollback}.
92
6cc170f0 93\S{using-sysmenu} The \i{System menu}
fc5a8711 94
95If you click the left mouse button on the icon in the top left
1388ecb1 96corner of PuTTY's terminal window, or click the right mouse button
97on the title bar, you will see the standard Windows system menu
98containing items like Minimise, Move, Size and Close.
fc5a8711 99
100PuTTY's system menu contains extra program features in addition to
101the Windows standard options. These extra menu commands are
102described below.
103
533d533c 104(These options are also available in a context menu brought up
105by holding Ctrl and clicking with the right mouse button anywhere
106in the PuTTY window.)
107
6cc170f0 108\S2{using-eventlog} The PuTTY \i{Event Log}
fc5a8711 109
110If you choose \q{Event Log} from the system menu, a small window
111will pop up in which PuTTY logs significant events during the
112connection. Most of the events in the log will probably take place
113during session startup, but a few can occur at any point in the
114session, and one or two occur right at the end.
115
116You can use the mouse to select one or more lines of the Event Log,
6cc170f0 117and hit the Copy button to copy them to the \i{clipboard}. If you
118are reporting a bug, it's often useful to paste the contents of the
fc5a8711 119Event Log into your bug report.
120
6cc170f0 121\S2{using-specials} \ii{Special commands}
6b590f79 122
6cc170f0 123Depending on the protocol used for the current session, there may be
124a submenu of \q{special commands}. These are protocol-specific
125tokens, such as a \i{\q{break} signal}, that can be sent down a
2c51c674 126connection in addition to normal data. Their precise effect is usually
127up to the server. Currently only Telnet and SSH have special commands.
6cc170f0 128
2c51c674 129The following special commands are available in Telnet:
130
3f2ce694 131\b \I{Are You There, Telnet special command}Are You There
2c51c674 132
3f2ce694 133\b \I{Break, Telnet special command}Break
2c51c674 134
3f2ce694 135\b \I{Synch, Telnet special command}Synch
2c51c674 136
3f2ce694 137\b \I{Erase Character, Telnet special command}Erase Character
2c51c674 138
76d3d354 139\lcont{
140PuTTY can also be configured to send this when the Backspace key is
141pressed; see \k{config-telnetkey}.
142}
143
3f2ce694 144\b \I{Erase Line, Telnet special command}Erase Line
2c51c674 145
3f2ce694 146\b \I{Go Ahead, Telnet special command}Go Ahead
2c51c674 147
3f2ce694 148\b \I{No Operation, Telnet special command}No Operation
2c51c674 149
3f2ce694 150\lcont{
151Should have no effect.
152}
2c51c674 153
3f2ce694 154\b \I{Abort Process, Telnet special command}Abort Process
2c51c674 155
3f2ce694 156\b \I{Abort Output, Telnet special command}Abort Output
2c51c674 157
3f2ce694 158\b \I{Interrupt Process, Telnet special command}Interrupt Process
2c51c674 159
76d3d354 160\lcont{
161PuTTY can also be configured to send this when Ctrl-C is typed; see
162\k{config-telnetkey}.
163}
164
3f2ce694 165\b \I{Suspend Process, Telnet special command}Suspend Process
2c51c674 166
76d3d354 167\lcont{
168PuTTY can also be configured to send this when Ctrl-Z is typed; see
169\k{config-telnetkey}.
170}
171
3f2ce694 172\b \I{End Of Record, Telnet special command}End Of Record
2c51c674 173
3f2ce694 174\b \I{End Of File, Telnet special command}End Of File
2c51c674 175
176In an SSH connection, the following special commands are available:
177
3f2ce694 178\b \I{Break, SSH special command}Break
2c51c674 179
3f2ce694 180\lcont{
181Optional extension; may not be supported by server. PuTTY requests the
182server's default break length.
183}
2c51c674 184
3f2ce694 185\b \I{IGNORE message, SSH special command}\I{No-op, in SSH}IGNORE message
2c51c674 186
3f2ce694 187\lcont{
188Should have no effect.
189}
6b590f79 190
fc5a8711 191\S2{using-newsession} Starting new sessions
192
193PuTTY's system menu provides some shortcut ways to start new
194sessions:
195
6cc170f0 196\b Selecting \i{\q{New Session}} will start a completely new
197instance of PuTTY, and bring up the configuration box as normal.
fc5a8711 198
6cc170f0 199\b Selecting \i{\q{Duplicate Session}} will start a session with
fc5a8711 200precisely the same options as your current one - connecting to the
201same host using the same protocol, with all the same terminal
202settings and everything.
203
6cc170f0 204\b The \i{\q{Saved Sessions} submenu} gives you quick access to any
fc5a8711 205sets of stored session details you have previously saved. See
206\k{config-saving} for details of how to create saved sessions.
207
6cc170f0 208\S2{using-changesettings} \I{settings, changing}Changing your
209session settings
fc5a8711 210
6cc170f0 211If you select \i{\q{Change Settings}} from the system menu, PuTTY will
fc5a8711 212display a cut-down version of its initial configuration box. This
213allows you to adjust most properties of your current session. You
214can change the terminal size, the font, the actions of various
215keypresses, the colours, and so on.
216
217Some of the options that are available in the main configuration box
218are not shown in the cut-down Change Settings box. These are usually
219options which don't make sense to change in the middle of a session
220(for example, you can't switch from SSH to Telnet in mid-session).
221
6cc170f0 222\S2{using-copyall} \i{Copy All to Clipboard}
fc5a8711 223
224This system menu option provides a convenient way to copy the whole
f20523db 225contents of the terminal screen (up to the last nonempty line) and
6cc170f0 226scrollback to the \i{clipboard} in one go.
fc5a8711 227
6cc170f0 228\S2{reset-terminal} \I{scrollback, clearing}Clearing and
229\I{terminal, resetting}resetting the terminal
fc5a8711 230
6cc170f0 231The \i{\q{Clear Scrollback}} option on the system menu tells PuTTY
232to discard all the lines of text that have been kept after they
fc5a8711 233scrolled off the top of the screen. This might be useful, for
234example, if you displayed sensitive information and wanted to make
235sure nobody could look over your shoulder and see it. (Note that
236this only prevents a casual user from using the scrollbar to view
237the information; the text is not guaranteed not to still be in
238PuTTY's memory.)
239
6cc170f0 240The \i{\q{Reset Terminal}} option causes a full reset of the
241terminal emulation. A VT-series terminal is a complex piece of
242software and can easily get into a state where all the text printed
243becomes unreadable. (This can happen, for example, if you
244accidentally output a binary file to your terminal.) If this
245happens, selecting Reset Terminal should sort it out.
fc5a8711 246
6cc170f0 247\S2{using-fullscreen} \ii{Full screen} mode
fc5a8711 248
249If you find the title bar on a maximised window to be ugly or
250distracting, you can select Full Screen mode to maximise PuTTY
251\q{even more}. When you select this, PuTTY will expand to fill the
252whole screen and its borders, title bar and scrollbar will
253disappear. (You can configure the scrollbar not to disappear in
a5a6cb30 254full-screen mode if you want to keep it; see \k{config-scrollback}.)
fc5a8711 255
256When you are in full-screen mode, you can still access the system
257menu if you click the left mouse button in the \e{extreme} top left
258corner of the screen.
259
6cc170f0 260\H{using-logging} Creating a \i{log file} of your \I{session
261log}session
fc5a8711 262
263For some purposes you may find you want to log everything that
6cc170f0 264appears on your screen. You can do this using the \i{\q{Logging}
265panel} in the configuration box.
fc5a8711 266
267To begin a session log, select \q{Change Settings} from the system
268menu and go to the Logging panel. Enter a log file name, and select
269a logging mode. (You can log all session output including the
270terminal control sequences, or you can just log the printable text.
271It depends what you want the log for.) Click \q{Apply} and your log
272will be started. Later on, you can go back to the Logging panel and
273select \q{Logging turned off completely} to stop logging; then PuTTY
274will close the log file and you can safely read it.
275
276See \k{config-logging} for more details and options.
277
6cc170f0 278\H{using-translation} Altering your \i{character set} configuration
fc5a8711 279
6cc170f0 280If you find that special characters (\i{accented characters}, for
fc5a8711 281example) are not being displayed correctly in your PuTTY session, it
282may be that PuTTY is interpreting the characters sent by the server
283according to the wrong \e{character set}. There are a lot of
284different character sets available, so it's entirely possible for
285this to happen.
286
6cc170f0 287If you click \q{Change Settings} and look at the \i{\q{Translation}
288panel}, you should see a large number of character sets which you
289can select. Now all you need is to find out which of them you want!
fc5a8711 290
6cc170f0 291\H{using-x-forwarding} Using \i{X11 forwarding} in SSH
2f8d6d43 292
293The SSH protocol has the ability to securely forward X Window System
294applications over your encrypted SSH connection, so that you can run
295an application on the SSH server machine and have it put its windows
296up on your local machine without sending any X network traffic in
297the clear.
298
299In order to use this feature, you will need an X display server for
300your Windows machine, such as X-Win32 or Exceed. This will probably
301install itself as display number 0 on your local machine; if it
6cc170f0 302doesn't, the manual for the \i{X server} should tell you what it
303does do.
2f8d6d43 304
305You should then tick the \q{Enable X11 forwarding} box in the
306Tunnels panel (see \k{config-ssh-x11}) before starting your SSH
307session. The \q{X display location} box reads \c{localhost:0} by
308default, which is the usual display location where your X server
309will be installed. If that needs changing, then change it.
310
311Now you should be able to log in to the SSH server as normal. To
312check that X forwarding has been successfully negotiated during
313connection startup, you can check the PuTTY Event Log (see
314\k{using-eventlog}). It should say something like this:
315
316\c 2001-12-05 17:22:01 Requesting X11 forwarding
317\c 2001-12-05 17:22:02 X11 forwarding enabled
318
319If the remote system is Unix or Unix-like, you should also be able
6cc170f0 320to see that the \i{\c{DISPLAY} environment variable} has been set to
2f8d6d43 321point at display 10 or above on the SSH server machine itself:
322
323\c fred@unixbox:~$ echo $DISPLAY
324\c unixbox:10.0
325
326If this works, you should then be able to run X applications in the
327remote session and have them display their windows on your PC.
328
329Note that if your PC X server requires authentication to connect,
330then PuTTY cannot currently support it. If this is a problem for
2b5567cf 331you, you should mail the PuTTY authors \#{FIXME} and give details
332(see \k{feedback}).
2f8d6d43 333
ee155ed5 334For more options relating to X11 forwarding, see \k{config-ssh-x11}.
335
6cc170f0 336\H{using-port-forwarding} Using \i{port forwarding} in SSH
2f8d6d43 337
338The SSH protocol has the ability to forward arbitrary network
339connections over your encrypted SSH connection, to avoid the network
340traffic being sent in clear. For example, you could use this to
341connect from your home computer to a POP-3 server on a remote
342machine without your POP-3 password being visible to network
343sniffers.
344
345In order to use port forwarding to connect from your local machine
346to a port on a remote server, you need to:
347
348\b Choose a port number on your local machine where PuTTY should
349listen for incoming connections. There are likely to be plenty of
6ee9b735 350unused port numbers above 3000. (You can also use a local loopback
dbe6c525 351address here; see below for more details.)
2f8d6d43 352
353\b Now, before you start your SSH connection, go to the Tunnels
354panel (see \k{config-ssh-portfwd}). Make sure the \q{Local} radio
355button is set. Enter the local port number into the \q{Source port}
356box. Enter the destination host name and port number into the
357\q{Destination} box, separated by a colon (for example,
358\c{popserver.example.com:110} to connect to a POP-3 server).
359
360\b Now click the \q{Add} button. The details of your port forwarding
361should appear in the list box.
362
c80f77d8 363Now start your session and log in. (Port forwarding will not be
364enabled until after you have logged in; otherwise it would be easy
365to perform completely anonymous network attacks, and gain access to
366anyone's virtual private network). To check that PuTTY has set up
367the port forwarding correctly, you can look at the PuTTY Event Log
368(see \k{using-eventlog}). It should say something like this:
2f8d6d43 369
370\c 2001-12-05 17:22:10 Local port 3110 forwarding to
371\c popserver.example.com:110
372
373Now if you connect to the source port number on your local PC, you
374should find that it answers you exactly as if it were the service
375running on the destination machine. So in this example, you could
376then configure an e-mail client to use \c{localhost:3110} as a POP-3
377server instead of \c{popserver.example.com:110}. (Of course, the
378forwarding will stop happening when your PuTTY session closes down.)
379
380You can also forward ports in the other direction: arrange for a
381particular port number on the \e{server} machine to be forwarded
382back to your PC as a connection to a service on your PC or near it.
383To do this, just select the \q{Remote} radio button instead of the
384\q{Local} one. The \q{Source port} box will now specify a port
385number on the \e{server} (note that most servers will not allow you
386to use port numbers under 1024 for this purpose).
fc5a8711 387
48b7c4b2 388An alternative way to forward local connections to remote hosts is
6cc170f0 389to use \I{dynamic port forwarding}dynamic \I{SOCKS} proxying. For
390this, you will need to select the \q{Dynamic} radio button instead
391of \q{Local}, and then you should not enter anything into the
392\q{Destination} box (it will be ignored). This will cause PuTTY to
393listen on the port you have specified, and provide a SOCKS proxy
394service to any programs which connect to that port. So, in
395particular, you can forward other PuTTY connections through it by
396setting up the Proxy control panel (see \k{config-proxy} for
397details).
48b7c4b2 398
beefa433 399The source port for a forwarded connection usually does not accept
400connections from any machine except the SSH client or server machine
401itself (for local and remote forwardings respectively). There are
402controls in the Tunnels panel to change this:
403
404\b The \q{Local ports accept connections from other hosts} option
48b7c4b2 405allows you to set up local-to-remote port forwardings (including
406dynamic port forwardings) in such a way that machines other than
407your client PC can connect to the forwarded port.
beefa433 408
409\b The \q{Remote ports do the same} option does the same thing for
410remote-to-local port forwardings (so that machines other than the
411SSH server machine can connect to the forwarded port.) Note that
412this feature is only available in the SSH 2 protocol, and not all
97e12fcd 413SSH 2 servers honour it (in OpenSSH, for example, it's usually
414disabled by default).
beefa433 415
6cc170f0 416You can also specify an \i{IP address} to listen on. Typically a
dbe6c525 417Windows machine can be asked to listen on any single IP address in
418the \cw{127.*.*.*} range, and all of these are loopback addresses
6cc170f0 419available only to the local machine. So if you forward (for example)
420\c{127.0.0.5:79} to a remote machine's \cw{finger} port, then you
421should be able to run commands such as \c{finger fred@127.0.0.5}.
422This can be useful if the program connecting to the forwarded port
423doesn't allow you to change the port number it uses. This feature is
424available for local-to-remote forwarded ports; SSH1 is unable to
425support it for remote-to-local ports, while SSH2 can support it in
426theory but servers will not necessarily cooperate.
427
85c598bf 428(Note that if you're using Windows XP Service Pack 2, you may need
429to obtain a fix from Microsoft in order to use addresses like
430\cw{127.0.0.5} - see \k{faq-alternate-localhost}.)
431
6cc170f0 432\H{using-rawprot} Making \i{raw TCP connections}
433
434A lot of \I{debugging Internet protocols}Internet protocols are
435composed of commands and responses in plain text. For example,
436\i{SMTP} (the protocol used to transfer e-mail), \i{NNTP} (the
437protocol used to transfer Usenet news), and \i{HTTP} (the protocol
438used to serve Web pages) all consist of commands in readable plain
439text.
2f8d6d43 440
441Sometimes it can be useful to connect directly to one of these
442services and speak the protocol \q{by hand}, by typing protocol
443commands and watching the responses. On Unix machines, you can do
444this using the system's \c{telnet} command to connect to the right
445port number. For example, \c{telnet mailserver.example.com 25} might
446enable you to talk directly to the SMTP service running on a mail
447server.
448
449Although the Unix \c{telnet} program provides this functionality,
450the protocol being used is not really Telnet. Really there is no
451actual protocol at all; the bytes sent down the connection are
452exactly the ones you type, and the bytes shown on the screen are
453exactly the ones sent by the server. Unix \c{telnet} will attempt to
454detect or guess whether the service it is talking to is a real
455Telnet service or not; PuTTY prefers to be told for certain.
456
457In order to make a debugging connection to a service of this type,
6cc170f0 458you simply select the fourth protocol name, \I{\q{Raw}
459protocol}\q{Raw}, from the \q{Protocol} buttons in the \q{Session}
460configuration panel. (See \k{config-hostname}.) You can then enter a
461host name and a port number, and make the connection.
a10c20dd 462
e117a742 463\H{using-cmdline} The PuTTY command line
a10c20dd 464
465PuTTY can be made to do various things without user intervention by
6cc170f0 466supplying \i{command-line arguments} (e.g., from a \i{command prompt
467window}, or a \i{Windows shortcut}).
a10c20dd 468
e117a742 469\S{using-cmdline-session} Starting a session from the command line
a10c20dd 470
6cc170f0 471\I\c{-ssh}\I\c{-telnet}\I\c{-rlogin}\I\c{-raw}These options allow
472you to bypass the configuration window and launch straight into a
473session.
a10c20dd 474
e117a742 475To start a connection to a server called \c{host}:
a10c20dd 476
e2a197cf 477\c putty.exe [-ssh | -telnet | -rlogin | -raw] [user@]host
a10c20dd 478
479If this syntax is used, settings are taken from the Default Settings
e2a197cf 480(see \k{config-saving}); \c{user} overrides these settings if
481supplied. Also, you can specify a protocol, which will override the
482default protocol (see \k{using-cmdline-protocol}).
a10c20dd 483
484For telnet sessions, the following alternative syntax is supported
6cc170f0 485(this makes PuTTY suitable for use as a URL handler for \i{telnet
486URLs} in web browsers):
a10c20dd 487
488\c putty.exe telnet://host[:port]/
489
490In order to start an existing saved session called \c{sessionname},
e117a742 491use the \c{-load} option (described in \k{using-cmdline-load}).
a10c20dd 492
e117a742 493\c putty.exe -load "session name"
a10c20dd 494
6cc170f0 495\S{using-cleanup} \i\c{-cleanup}
a10c20dd 496
497If invoked with the \c{-cleanup} option, rather than running as
498normal, PuTTY will remove its registry entries and random seed file
499from the local machine (after confirming with the user).
e117a742 500
501\S{using-general-opts} Standard command-line options
502
503PuTTY and its associated tools support a range of command-line
504options, most of which are consistent across all the tools. This
505section lists the available options in all tools. Options which are
506specific to a particular tool are covered in the chapter about that
507tool.
508
6cc170f0 509\S2{using-cmdline-load} \i\c{-load}: load a saved session
e117a742 510
6cc170f0 511\I{saved sessions, loading from command line}The \c{-load} option
512causes PuTTY to load configuration details out of a saved session.
513If these details include a host name, then this option is all you
33f07e96 514need to make PuTTY start a session.
e117a742 515
516You need double quotes around the session name if it contains spaces.
517
518If you want to create a Windows shortcut to start a PuTTY saved
519session, this is the option you should use: your shortcut should
520call something like
521
522\c d:\path\to\putty.exe -load "my session"
523
524(Note that PuTTY itself supports an alternative form of this option,
525for backwards compatibility. If you execute \c{putty @sessionname}
526it will have the same effect as \c{putty -load "sessionname"}. With
527the \c{@} form, no double quotes are required, and the \c{@} sign
528must be the very first thing on the command line. This form of the
529option is deprecated.)
530
531\S2{using-cmdline-protocol} Selecting a protocol: \c{-ssh},
532\c{-telnet}, \c{-rlogin}, \c{-raw}
533
534To choose which protocol you want to connect with, you can use one
535of these options:
536
6cc170f0 537\b \i\c{-ssh} selects the SSH protocol.
e117a742 538
6cc170f0 539\b \i\c{-telnet} selects the Telnet protocol.
e117a742 540
6cc170f0 541\b \i\c{-rlogin} selects the Rlogin protocol.
e117a742 542
6cc170f0 543\b \i\c{-raw} selects the raw protocol.
e117a742 544
545These options are not available in the file transfer tools PSCP and
546PSFTP (which only work with the SSH protocol).
547
6cc170f0 548These options are equivalent to the \i{protocol selection} buttons
549in the Session panel of the PuTTY configuration box (see
e117a742 550\k{config-hostname}).
551
6cc170f0 552\S2{using-cmdline-v} \i\c{-v}: increase verbosity
e117a742 553
6cc170f0 554\I{verbose mode}Most of the PuTTY tools can be made to tell you more
555about what they are doing by supplying the \c{-v} option. If you are
556having trouble when making a connection, or you're simply curious,
557you can turn this switch on and hope to find out more about what is
558happening.
e117a742 559
6cc170f0 560\S2{using-cmdline-l} \i\c{-l}: specify a \i{login name}
e117a742 561
562You can specify the user name to log in as on the remote server
563using the \c{-l} option. For example, \c{plink login.example.com -l
564fred}.
565
566These options are equivalent to the username selection box in the
567Connection panel of the PuTTY configuration box (see
568\k{config-username}).
569
b7a5df66 570\S2{using-cmdline-portfwd} \I{-L-upper}\c{-L}, \I{-R-upper}\c{-R}
571and \I{-D-upper}\c{-D}: set up \i{port forwardings}
e117a742 572
573As well as setting up port forwardings in the PuTTY configuration
574(see \k{config-ssh-portfwd}), you can also set up forwardings on the
575command line. The command-line options work just like the ones in
576Unix \c{ssh} programs.
577
578To forward a local port (say 5110) to a remote destination (say
579\cw{popserver.example.com} port 110), you can write something like
580one of these:
581
582\c putty -L 5110:popserver.example.com:110 -load mysession
583\c plink mysession -L 5110:popserver.example.com:110
584
48b7c4b2 585To forward a remote port to a local destination, just use the \c{-R}
586option instead of \c{-L}:
e117a742 587
588\c putty -R 5023:mytelnetserver.myhouse.org:23 -load mysession
589\c plink mysession -R 5023:mytelnetserver.myhouse.org:23
590
dbe6c525 591To specify an IP address for the listening end of the tunnel,
592prepend it to the argument:
593
594\c plink -L 127.0.0.5:23:localhost:23 myhost
595
48b7c4b2 596To set up SOCKS-based dynamic port forwarding on a local port, use
597the \c{-D} option. For this one you only have to pass the port
598number:
599
600\c putty -D 4096 -load mysession
601
e117a742 602For general information on port forwarding, see
603\k{using-port-forwarding}.
604
605These options are not available in the file transfer tools PSCP and
606PSFTP.
607
6cc170f0 608\S2{using-cmdline-m} \i\c{-m}: read a remote command or script from
609a file
e117a742 610
6cc170f0 611The \i\c{-m} option performs a similar function to the \q{Remote
e117a742 612command} box in the SSH panel of the PuTTY configuration box (see
613\k{config-command}). However, the \c{-m} option expects to be given
6cc170f0 614a local file name, and it will read a command from that file. On
615most Unix systems, you can even put multiple lines in this file and
4e930b58 616execute more than one command in sequence, or a whole shell script;
617but this will not work on all servers (and is known not to work
618with certain \q{embedded} servers such as routers).
e117a742 619
620This option is not available in the file transfer tools PSCP and
621PSFTP.
622
b7a5df66 623\S2{using-cmdline-p} \I{-P-upper}\c{-P}: specify a \i{port number}
e117a742 624
e2a197cf 625The \c{-P} option is used to specify the port number to connect to. If
626you have a Telnet server running on port 9696 of a machine instead of
627port 23, for example:
e117a742 628
e2a197cf 629\c putty -telnet -P 9696 host.name
630\c plink -telnet -P 9696 host.name
e117a742 631
632(Note that this option is more useful in Plink than in PuTTY,
633because in PuTTY you can write \c{putty -telnet host.name 9696} in
634any case.)
635
6cc170f0 636This option is equivalent to the port number control in the Session
637panel of the PuTTY configuration box (see \k{config-hostname}).
e117a742 638
6cc170f0 639\S2{using-cmdline-pw} \i\c{-pw}: specify a \i{password}
e117a742 640
641A simple way to automate a remote login is to supply your password
642on the command line. This is \e{not recommended} for reasons of
643security. If you possibly can, we recommend you set up public-key
644authentication instead. See \k{pubkey} for details.
645
646Note that the \c{-pw} option only works when you are using the SSH
647protocol. Due to fundamental limitations of Telnet and Rlogin, these
648protocols do not support automated password authentication.
649
b7a5df66 650\S2{using-cmdline-agent} \I{-A-upper}\c{-A} and \i\c{-a}: control \i{agent
6cc170f0 651forwarding}
e117a742 652
653The \c{-A} option turns on SSH agent forwarding, and \c{-a} turns it
654off. These options are only meaningful if you are using SSH.
655
6cc170f0 656See \k{pageant} for general information on \i{Pageant}, and
e117a742 657\k{pageant-forward} for information on agent forwarding. Note that
658there is a security risk involved with enabling this option; see
659\k{pageant-security} for details.
660
661These options are equivalent to the agent forwarding checkbox in the
662Auth panel of the PuTTY configuration box (see \k{config-ssh-agentfwd}).
663
664These options are not available in the file transfer tools PSCP and
665PSFTP.
666
b7a5df66 667\S2{using-cmdline-x11} \I{-X-upper}\c{-X} and \i\c{-x}: control \i{X11
6cc170f0 668forwarding}
e117a742 669
670The \c{-X} option turns on X11 forwarding in SSH, and \c{-x} turns
671it off. These options are only meaningful if you are using SSH.
672
673For information on X11 forwarding, see \k{using-x-forwarding}.
674
675These options are equivalent to the X11 forwarding checkbox in the
676Tunnels panel of the PuTTY configuration box (see
677\k{config-ssh-x11}).
678
679These options are not available in the file transfer tools PSCP and
680PSFTP.
681
b7a5df66 682\S2{using-cmdline-pty} \i\c{-t} and \I{-T-upper}\c{-T}: control
6cc170f0 683\i{pseudo-terminal allocation}
e117a742 684
685The \c{-t} option ensures PuTTY attempts to allocate a
686pseudo-terminal at the server, and \c{-T} stops it from allocating
687one. These options are only meaningful if you are using SSH.
688
689These options are equivalent to the \q{Don't allocate a
690pseudo-terminal} checkbox in the SSH panel of the PuTTY
691configuration box (see \k{config-ssh-pty}).
692
693These options are not available in the file transfer tools PSCP and
694PSFTP.
695
b7a5df66 696\S2{using-cmdline-compress} \I{-C-upper}\c{-C}: enable \i{compression}
e117a742 697
698The \c{-C} option enables compression of the data sent across the
699network. This option is only meaningful if you are using SSH.
700
701This option is equivalent to the \q{Enable compression} checkbox in
702the SSH panel of the PuTTY configuration box (see
703\k{config-ssh-comp}).
704
6cc170f0 705\S2{using-cmdline-sshprot} \i\c{-1} and \i\c{-2}: specify an \i{SSH
706protocol version}
e117a742 707
6cc170f0 708The \c{-1} and \c{-2} options force PuTTY to use version \I{SSH1}1
709or version \I{SSH2}2 of the SSH protocol. These options are only
710meaningful if you are using SSH.
e117a742 711
712These options are equivalent to selecting your preferred SSH
713protocol version as \q{1 only} or \q{2 only} in the SSH panel of the
714PuTTY configuration box (see \k{config-ssh-prot}).
715
6cc170f0 716\S2{using-cmdline-identity} \i\c{-i}: specify an SSH \i{private key}
e117a742 717
718The \c{-i} option allows you to specify the name of a private key
8cee3b72 719file in \c{*.PPK} format which PuTTY will use to authenticate with the
720server. This option is only meaningful if you are using SSH.
e117a742 721
6cc170f0 722For general information on \i{public-key authentication}, see
723\k{pubkey}.
e117a742 724
725This option is equivalent to the \q{Private key file for
726authentication} box in the Auth panel of the PuTTY configuration box
727(see \k{config-ssh-privkey}).