PuTTY

If you are wanting to connect from a Windows machine to an SSH client, on Linux, BSD, etc then probably there is nothing better than PuTTY for this. However, if you are using SSH keys, then it can be a little, abstract to start with.

You need a PPK format private key, and you have to tell PuTTY where to find this, and what connection name to use. First of course, is to enter the IP address or FQDN that you are connecting to…

Next, you need to click on the left menu, go down SSH and then Auth to find where you can insert the private key for the connection.

Finally, you need to tell it what username you wish to connect to on the host – you will find this in the Connection, Data section, which is not at all obvious.

Once you have added these, click on Open to open the connection and you should connect in direct!