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NUIT >
SSCC >
HOWTOs >
Connecting with X-Win32
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Connecting with X-Win32
X-Win32 is a program for Windows computers that allows you to securely connect to the SSCC and to use graphical programs on the interactive computers (seldon, hardin and mule2). X-Win32 is available for free at Northwestern under an unlimited campus site license.
Download X-Win32 with SSH from
Run the installer file you have downloaded and follow the installation instructions.
Once you have installed X-Win32 on your computer, go to the Windows start menu and run the X-Config utility.
Click on the Wizard button.
Select StarNetSSH as the Connect Method.
Type in the SSCC host name:
Enter your SSCC login (your NetID) but do not enter your password. You will be prompted for the password each time you connect.
Select Linux from the list in the Host Command window.
Enter a name for this configuration and click Finish.
To connect using X-Win32 from an off-campus location you first need to establish a Northwestern Cisco VPN connection. It is important to use the Cisco software for off-campus access. The built-in VPN software does not make reliable off-campus connections.
Once you are connected with VPN, start the X-Config utility again and click on the Display tab. In the list of Available IP addresses select the (proxy) option. A new window will open prompting you to enter proxy address. Enter the IP address assigned to your computer by the Northwestern VPN (165.124.xxx.xxx). If you started X-Config after connecting to the VPN this address will be displayed in the list of available IP addresses. You have to repeat this step every time you connect to the VPN because the IP address assigned to you is different each time.
Start X-Win32 from the Windows start menu.
When you start X-Win32 for the first time in Windows XP, you should get a security alert from Windows Firewall. Click "Keep Blocking" - this will not prevent X-Win32 from working.
Right-click on the blue X icon in the Windows notification area (in the lower right-hand corner of the desktop) and select your SSCC configuration from the Sessions menu.
You will be prompted for your password and a new terminal window will open for entering commands.
Type something in the terminal window and check whether the backspace key is working. If the backspace key does not work in the terminal window, look at these instructions
When following these instructions, you will probably have to maximize the Keyboard Editor window to see everything you need because there are no scroll bars. You may find that your US.XKB file is read-only. If so, right-click that file and choose Properties. Uncheck the read-only box so that you can change the file. Do this BEFORE using X-Config to modify the keyboard definition. The path to the file in most cases is
Copy and Paste rules are different under X Windows. The UNIX X Windows mouse has three buttons (left, middle and right), and the MS Windows mouse has only two buttons (left and right). X-Win32 emulates the middle mouse button when you press both mouse buttons simultaneously. Things are complicated even more when you want to copy and paste between MS Windows applications and X Windows applications. See How to Copy and Paste in X-Win32 to learn how to properly configure your X-Win32 connection and then use it to copy and paste in all combinations..
Graphical access to the interactive computers is useful for tasks that are not computationally-intensive, taking hours of time to execute. Graphical programs started using X-Win32 run on the interactive computers, not on the compute nodes, so please do not perform long calculations with them. Remember to close your X-Win32 session when you are done. Graphical programs are typically run in the background, to free your command line for further work. Follow the command for a graphical program with an ampersand (&) — for example, xstata & — to run xstata in the background in a separate window. Here are some of the programs with graphical interfaces you might want to use: Editors — emacs, gvim, lyx and nedit Document Viewers — acroread, gv, lyx, mozilla and xdvi Graphics Tools — gimp, xfig PBS Pro Utilities — xpbs, xpbsmon TeX Utilities — lyx, xdvi Statistical Applications — MATLAB, R, SAS, Splus, xstata Utilities — gftp, xclock, xterm acroread — Acrobat reader for viewing PDF files emacs — GNU project Emacs editor gftp — graphical ftp/sftp client for downloading files from other servers directly to the cluster gimp — an image manipulation and paint program gv — a PostScript and PDF viewer gvim —Vi IMproved, a programmer's text editor lyx — a document preparation system matlab — a computational, visualization and programming environment (run with the command matlab -jvm -desktop) mozilla — a Web browser for X11 derived from Netscape Communicator nedit — windows-like text editor for creating and editing your programs and shell scripts R — a language for data analysis and graphics sas —an integrated applications system for data access, management, analysis and presentation Splus — an interactive environment for data analysis and graphics (run with the command Splus -g) xclock — display an analog or digital clock in an X window xdvi — DVI previewer for the X window system xfig — Facility for Interactive Generation of figures under X windows xpbs — graphical front end to PBS commands to manage batch jobs xpbsmon — monitor execution hosts under PBS xstata — Stata with the graphical desktop xterm — terminal emulator for X windows |
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