Navigate on the left hand menu to “Connection -> SSH -> Auth” to get to this screen:Ĭlick on “Browse” and navigate to find your stored *.ppk key file, and click “Open.”

Open Putty and enter your IP address or hostname as is specified above. Save and quit the file by typing :wq and then hit the return key Configuring the Private Key To edit the file, type the following command to open it up in the vi editor:Ĭopy the public key, either from where you have saved it or from PuTTYgen, and paste it into vi, like so: You can verify that the authorized_keys file exists by typing ls If you need to configure your system to be able to take an SSH key, you will want to place a copy of your public key into the ~/.ssh/authorized_keys file on the server.įirst log into your SSH account using the password method, and then navigate to ~/.ssh directory. If you need to connect to your VPS using an SSH key pair, you will need to follow the following steps: Once you have successfully logged in, you should get a screen that looks something like this: Connecting to a VPS with PuTTy Using an SSH Key Passwords in Linux are case sensitive so you must type it exactly. Also, unlike in Windows systems, you will not see evidence of your typing, the screen will remain blank as you enter it. It is important to note that you will not be able to paste in your password you must type it manually. Under “Preferred SSH protocol version” make sure you check “2” (“1” is an older and less secure version of SSH).Īt this point, you can open your SSH window, by clicking “Open.” You'll also want to verify your SSH settings, so on the left menu, under “Connection,” click on “SSH” and you will see this screen: In the field labeled Host Name (or IP address), enter the IP address or hostname of your PuTTy compatible VPS, like so: Connect to a VPS with PuTTy via PasswordĪfter opening PuTTY, you should see a screen that looks something like this: After it has finished being installed, start up PuTTY. Once you have downloaded the appropriate file, double-click on the installation icon, and run the Windows installer. If you are still unsure, you can always choose the 32-bit version it should run without trouble on either system. You will be provided all the necessary information. If you are unsure of whether you are running a 32-bit or 64-bit system, you can check by right-clicking on the Windows Start menu and choosing “System”. You'll need too choose the appropriate *.msi installation file for your system while doing so. First, if you have not done so already, you will want to download PuTTY. To get PuTTY working requires a small amount of configuration. PuTTY is a free utility which will allow command-line access to your server. When connecting to your Linux-based VPS from a Windows system, the most common way of doing that is via SSH, using PuTTY. Feel free to sign up to BitLaunch for use in this PuTTy VPS tutorial.

Putty for mac serial connection