MobaXterm

MobaXterm [1] is an enhanced terminal for Windows with X11 server, tabbed SSH client, network tools and much more. MobaXterm provides Windows environment to create files and directories and edit them using windows editor like notepad. It has visual enabled SSH, SFTP, RDP sessions under a single hood to enable easy file transfer and remote desktop.

Important Notes

You need to have HPC access
MobaXterm is only available for Windows
For Mac, you can download XQuartz for GUI access

Download & Install

MobaXterm can be downloaded from MobaTek website and it is a simple windows installation. Download the free "Home Edition"

Accessing HPC through MobaXterm

Open MobaXterm application. You will see the GUI.

Open a new Session and enter 'Pioneer' in Remote host, check box Specify username and enter your caseID then click OK . When you are prompted for the password, use SSO (Single Sign On) password.

You can also start local terminal. From the local machine prompt, access the cluster with (X Forwarding option -X) or you can also create a ssh session for hpc login nodes (e.g hpc3, hpc4) using "Session" menu.

[<prompt>] ➤ ssh -X <caseID>@pioneer.case.edu

You can open the X terminal using:

xterm &

Testing

srun --x11 --pty /bin/bash

module load matlab

matlab &

Details

Create new sessions

SSH & SFTP, VNC, RDP etc sessions.

The same SSH session can be used for SFTP.

SFTP (Transfer) Operations

Click on SFTP tab on the left panel

Download:

Rt click on the listed file in HPC (e.g. /home/<caseID>/<path-to-file>), select download, and browse to the location in your PC to download. OR select the download icon on the top

Upload:

Click on the upload icon on the Menu bar to upload the file from PC to the existing directory (in HPC) or change the location using the icon on the Menu bar.

Create/Delete/Edit:

You can also create file and directory and delete them using the icons in the Menu bar which are equivalent to Linux commands such as mkdir, rm, and vi.

Edit the file by right clicking and opening it in Notepad. Once you save it, it will be saved in your HPC space.

Settings:

"Settings" help you to choose options to customize your sessions such as Font, Color, X-11 forwarding (default) etc.

CLI Transfer:

If you type pwd, you will be on /home/mobaxterm. If you type ls, you will see the files in your PC "Desktop", "MyDocuments" etc. Go to those directories and download the file/directory from HPC. Let's download the test directory from pioneer:

scp -r <caseID>@pioneer.case.edu:$HOME/test .

References:

[1] MobaXterm Home