# How safe is Putty? And what alternatives are there?



## OM2 (Oct 28, 2007)

Can someone tell me how safe Putty.exe is?
When you load it, it gives you a warning or something saying that information won't be sent encrypted (or something to that effect)

Really useful when you want to upload something that contains zillions of files - just upload a zip and use putty to unzip

ALSO: what other alternatives are there?
I know there's a graphical equivalent - just can't remember the name!
Are there any others?

My main purpose: uploading and unzipping zip files (or rar's) + zipping online and downloading

The uploading and downloading I normally ould just use FTP for the zip file

Thanks


OM


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## Squashman (Apr 4, 2003)

I am not quite sure what your problem is with it. Putty is mostly used to connect to terminal sessions like Telnet and SSH. There isn't a need for GUI for this.

I have never gotten the message you are receiving. I would assume you are getting that message because you are connecting to a server that isn't using any type of encryption.

If you want something to FTP files back and forth then use FileZilla.


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## OM2 (Oct 28, 2007)

thanks for the reply
the message is th emessage u get when u first run the program - it's never displayed again afterwards
it's just a standard message of disclaimer

i don't think i'm connecting using that isn't any different to any other domain

filezilla?
yes sure
but have you ever tried uploading 10,000 joomla installation files? 
better to upload zip using ftp, connect with putty and then unzip
similarly when downloaidng large number of files: just connect using putty and zip files and then download using ftp

actually, i also use putty to duplicate directories - while preserving all file permissions exactly as they exist in the original copy
(also quicker to use to delete many files)

the above is all i do
it would be nice to have a gui interface application 
i know there exists at least one program that allows u to upload a zip and then unzip that


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## lotuseclat79 (Sep 12, 2003)

Telnet is not safe, i.e. always use pUTTy which is safe.

-- Tom


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## OM2 (Oct 28, 2007)

aah... i think that answers my question
i may have got the actual question wrong: i had heard telnet is unsafe... and mixed up with putty

thanks


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## Squashman (Apr 4, 2003)

Putty can be used to connect to a Telnet session which makes it unsafe. If you are connecting to a SSH server using SSH2 with Putty then you are probably fine.

I understand what you are saying with zipping things up first, but alot of Web Hosting companies do not allow Shell Access. So then you will have to fall back on using an FTP client like Filezilla.

The only way you are going to get a GUI to your web hosting account is if they have a VNC server install, which is highly unlikely because this will create a lot of overhead on the web server. Or an NX server and again, I don't think they would want that kind of overhead on the Web Server.


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## OM2 (Oct 28, 2007)

aaah...
i normally just run putty, type in ftp address and hit enter!
just checked: i'm connecting using ssh option ticked
i've clicked around but dont see anything relating to 'ssh2'?
am i missing something?
thanks


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## Squashman (Apr 4, 2003)

Connection Category > SSH.

I would says most servers are running SSH2 anyways. When I was running Linux for my web server I had my ssh config file set to SSH2 only.


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