Time to get into a very exciting topic. If you’re used to working on a Linux workstation but find yourself using a Windows machine for some crazy reason (hello WFH), you will undoubtedly be missing the versatility of a classic Linux terminal to manage your remote sessions. The easiest solution to connect from Windows to a Linux system of course is via a terminal emulator like PuTTY, which has been the quick-fix mainstay emulator for many years. However, sometimes you want a little more versatility and by versatility, we’re talking about tabs. Ok, maybe not just tabs, but certainly having the option of a tabbed interface is definitely better than opening up multiple individual terminals/sessions.
Now for the main event! Let’s take a look at some terminal emulators that are also…
…Alternatives to PuTTY
KiTTY
KiTTY is almost identical to the classic PuTTY in both look and feel although KiTTY has a whole host of features too numerous to mention here. Unlike PuTTY which is available for Linux as well as Windows, KiTTY is only available for Windows platforms. One super cool feature of KiTTY is the fact that it’s even called KiTTY. Because you know, cats.
MobaXterm
MobaXterm is all about the tabs. Indeed it is much, much more and has the usual required features that any console-using, ssh-ing fool is going to need (multiple sessions, ssh tunnels, X11 server, SFTP GUI, rsync, to name a few) but tabbed sessions is really where it’s at. For years (YEARS) I struggled when I was away form a LINUX host and had to turn to PuTTY, which resulted in multiple PuTTY sessions hanging around my desktop. Now don’t get me wrong: PuTTY is always awesome in a pinch, including the fact that you can be up and running in seconds after clicking on that familiar executable. For a longer term (get it? TERM??) solution, MobaXterm is pretty sweet, what with the tabbed interface and all.
mRemoteNG
Like MobaXterm, mRemoteNG is also a tabbed terminal emulator with a ton of features AND it’s available in a ton of languages. To get to the point, there is little that you will not be able to do with mRemoteNG as it is versatile and has extensive features. Personally, I find mRemoteNG’s GUI to be cleaner and easier to set up out of the gate and mRemoteNG’s documentation is very clear and concise.
SecureCRT
As the name hints at, SecureCRT provides terminal emulation with encryption as per the Secure Shell Protocol (SSH, SCP, SFTP etc). SecureCRT also lets users enjoy a tabbed or tiled experience, which is great when you have a large monitors with lots of real estate as it’s often useful to see what’s going on in other shells concurrently. SecureCRT’s features are also many as they are copious.
SolarPuTTY
Last but not least, SolarPuTTY also employs a tabbed interface with a slick browser design including saved sessions to make logging in that much easier. SolarPuTTY also allows for a great amount if customization, which is great when you want to add some excitement to an otherwise boring login or secure file transfer. You know what I’m talking about.
And that’s it for now. We’ll update this post later on with some more features and all that.