
KiTTY – A fork of PuTTY 0.67 with many additional features - xenophonf
http://www.9bis.net/kitty/
======
Mahn
Fun fact: The ssh-agent equivalent for Windows that ships with PuTTY (pageant)
has a limited amount of memory reserved to store the actual keys (8kb) which
causes it to stop responding when more than 25 keys or so are used. Because
they have no GitHub, no easy way to collaborate on the source, and the
developers don't reply emails, this has gone unfixed for years, and even
though PuTTY is open source and you can fix it yourself and use your build
(which we did), the worst is that we quickly found out that almost every
independent tool on Windows that relays on SSH copy pasted the source of PuTTY
almost verbatim, since we found this bug in many places afterwards, including
closed source applications.

Bottom line, set your workflow on Linux or at least bash for Windows if you
manage or plan to manage many machines.

~~~
INTPenis
I very rarely use Windows but one particular client has a VPN that only works
in Windows so I recently switched from Kitty to Cygwin and am much happier.

Configured mintty with solarized colors, source code pro font and it's as good
as it gets on Windows.

~~~
emmelaich
Love mintty with solarized!

------
randallsquared
Coming from Linux/macOS, PuTTY was one of the things that always drove me
bonkers. So much clicking to change settings. So many times I was uncertain
about whether I'd edited or saved the right session.

I'm trying out Windows again, and the whole environment seems to have
massively improved in the four years since I last played with it: after
installing bash for windows and docker for windows and openssh through scoop,
I can open a command line and use native ssh, or type "bash" and use the usual
Linux version, or "docker run ..." and use whatever I'm used to there. Given
all these great options, it's not clear to me why anyone would go back to a
separate GUI tool?

~~~
tokenizerrr
> Given all these great options, it's not clear to me why anyone would go back
> to a separate GUI tool?

You're clearly a Linux person. Or at least a command line person. I am too.
Quite a few programmers at my work have never used anything but Windows and
barely touch any servers. So they don't really use the command line at all,
ever.

They also insist on using graphical clients for Git. This is of course
horribly inefficient and leads to plenty of problems (mostly due to their
choice of the Eclipse Git Client, which seems to have a lot of bugs). But they
think the command line is scary and too difficult to understand.

So, my point is, there are a lot of people who have used GUIs their entire
life and are used to be able to figure things out by just staring at the GUI
and spending 30 minutes aimlessly clicking about. Then when they use a CLI
program they have no idea what to do, and get frustrated. Because they're not
used to RTFM.

~~~
egeozcan
We wanted to switch to Git from Mercurial because we wanted something like
Gitlab. The only reason we didn't was that there wasn't any app for Git which
was as user-friendly as TortoiseHg.

~~~
WayneBro
There is TortoiseGit!

~~~
kevin_thibedeau
Which pales in comparison to the multi-platform goodness of TortoiseHg since
it is an independent creation designed from the ground up for the distributed
workflow rather than a reworked TortoiseSVN. I wish someone would do a Git
conversion of THG.

~~~
WayneBro
Besides not being cross platform, how does it pale in comparison?

I've been using it for over five years and I can't imagine what it could
possibly be missing...

------
thunderbong
I've been a very happy user of MobaXTerm for many years. Generates keys, has
inbuilt sftp, and X11 forwarding.

[http://mobaxterm.mobatek.net/](http://mobaxterm.mobatek.net/)

~~~
teh_klev
Totally agree, I don't know why there's such a blind spot for MobaXTerm. You
can run up multiple copies of the free version to get around most of the
limitations (I even do that with my paid for edition because I get better
session tab management) .

~~~
zem
i'd not heard of it before; it does look like it has some very nice features.
wonder why it didn't come up when i was searching for a windows sftp client
recently.

~~~
teh_klev
It was Sam Saffron, one of the ex Stack Overflow and now Discourse developers
that turned me on to it:

[https://samsaffron.com/archive/2013/05/03/eliminating-my-
tri...](https://samsaffron.com/archive/2013/05/03/eliminating-my-trivial-
inconveniences#comment-4)

------
mickrussom
Honestly, the #1 terminal program is SecureCRT and its worth paying for. The
only reason: There are two great and efficient ways of managing logins and
session information. I wish there way an open copy of SecureCRT but I've yet
to find one and SCRT is cheap enough to where I just stick with it. Kitty is
interesting but I wish session management was scrt style.

~~~
blueatlas
Try mRemoteNG. It's not quite SecureCRT, but I switched long ago and haven't
regretted the move. It has a nice tabbed UI and supports many protocols (ssh,
RDP, VNC, etc.). It has recently returned to active development.

------
tachion
Isn't `ssh` the best SSH client in the world, despite the KiTTY's claim? Not
to mention, that I'd describe PuTTY/KiTTY more like 'only usable ssh client on
windows platform' rather than what they're claiming on their website ;)

~~~
zokier
There are several ports of OpenSSH for Windows if you prefer that.

~~~
justincormack
Microsoft is porting it officially too now.

------
tw04
I've always preferred this build:

[https://puttytray.goeswhere.com/](https://puttytray.goeswhere.com/)

------
oblio
IMO just abandon the crutch provided by PuTTY and use Cygwin +
Console2/ConsoleZ/Conemu. You'll get the "official" SSH, with support for
normal SSH keys, a rather complete and solid Unix tools setup plus a decent
terminal wrapping the Windows console. You'll also be able to switch between
Cygwin / cmd / Powershell with ease.

------
sprremix
For everyone who works with multiple sessions, there's this tabbed putty
version out as well:
[https://github.com/jimradford/superputty](https://github.com/jimradford/superputty)

~~~
sofaofthedamned
I've always had issues with these wrappers around Putty, in that they never
seem to deal with focus correctly.

My biggest issue with KiTTY was that it saved the username for subsequent
windows - which was really hard to deal with when i'd mistyped the name!
Anybody know a keyboard shortcut to forget which user was entered?

~~~
joatmon-snoo
I think this may actually be a PuTTY bug itself. I use PuTTY Tray on a regular
basis and see this whenever I switch machines.

------
freewizard
Good work!

Could you replace the url with an HTTPS one?
[https://www.9bis.net/kitty/](https://www.9bis.net/kitty/) seems working.

It seems a no brainer, but I 'm just surprised that putty.org is http only.

~~~
voltagex_
That's because putty.org isn't the official site for PuTTY. Think of it like
"friendly" domain squatting, then despair at the security implications.

See [https://noncombatant.org/2014/03/03/downloading-software-
saf...](https://noncombatant.org/2014/03/03/downloading-software-safely-is-
nearly-impossible/) (but many of the points have been resolved)

------
makkesk8
Kitty is quite great, but there's better ones like xshell

~~~
linker3000
I seem to have stuck with mRemoteNG due to its tabbed interface support for
ssh, VNC, RDP and other protcols

------
CraigJPerry
I sometimes think the lack of password saving in putty did more to promulgate
the use of ssh keys than anything else.

Kitty has a bunch of useful features , I'll give it a go.

~~~
frumiousirc
The ability to leak and reuse passwords in general did more to promulgate the
use of ssh keys than anything else.

------
urza
If you are on windows and want nice console, I like Cmder:
[http://cmder.net/](http://cmder.net/)

------
denfromufa
It is a pitty that tty is not natively ported to Windows. Jupyter terminal is
not available due to this:

[https://github.com/jupyter/notebook/issues/172](https://github.com/jupyter/notebook/issues/172)

~~~
duskwuff
TTYs are a kernel feature which aren't present at all in Windows. It's not
clear how one could "port" them, short of writing a driver (which I'm not sure
is even possible).

~~~
denfromufa
Although winpty is not feature-complete and requires 2 tool-chains for
building, still it is not a kernel driver:

[https://github.com/rprichard/winpty](https://github.com/rprichard/winpty)

------
_RPM
One of the most annoying things about PuTTY is that the black default
background is too dark to see. For example, I always have to change it to
light background because I can't see my VIM buffer very easily. It also handle
the alt arrow keys.

------
barbwire
"KiTTY is a fork from version 0.67 of PuTTY, the best telnet / SSH client in
the world."

Wow - if PuTTY is "the best client in the world" then this must be, by
definition, an inferior product.

------
neolefty
Is there a link to the source code?

Edit: found it on the downloads page
[http://www.9bis.net/kitty/?page=Download](http://www.9bis.net/kitty/?page=Download)

------
rhabarba
And if you want to stay updated with new versions:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12938269](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12938269)

;-)

------
slim
The best is Teraterm [http://ttssh2.osdn.jp](http://ttssh2.osdn.jp)

------
mythz
I'm happy with bash/ssh in Ubuntu on Windows 10 - finally a clean, full-
featured SSH client.

~~~
freehunter
But if all you need is SSH, I'm sure Kitty is smaller than Ubuntu.

------
KirinDave
There is an officially maintained port (by microsoft) of openssh for
PowerShell. There's also full ssh support in the Bash for Windows support.

Maybe someone can explain to me what's valuable about PuTTY or KiTTY given
this?

~~~
coredog64
I only see one release on GitHub: v.0.0.3.0.

The first line of the release notes is the following sentence: "This is a pre-
release (non-production ready)".

Microsoft's implementation includes the full sshd. While I'm happy they're
finally onboard with that (could have used it 10 years ago), that's overkill
compared to PuTTY/KiTTY.

~~~
KirinDave
Why?

Most people will never run it.

------
Nexxxeh
I love KiTTY, the little additions makes Windows use smarter and easier.

------
robhack
How does it compare to SmarTTY? (other than its awesome name!)

------
joshbaptiste
This is cool.. The pscp integration alone is worth me trying.

------
phyushin
I like putty... It suffices for my needs

~~~
freehunter
Yeah, there are a few things that annoy me about Putty but not enough to
actually switch. Granted, Putty is pre-installed on every machine I touch that
doesn't have ssh natively installed, but for the most part it just works. All
the problems I have with it disappear as soon as I'm logged into a remote
server.

------
dinnouti
After fighting with Putty to managed saved sessions between computers, I end
up using cmder and the ssh CLI.

------
jjawssd
Where's the Github/Gitlab repo?

------
epalm
How is it possible in this day and age that both
[http://www.9bis.net/kitty/](http://www.9bis.net/kitty/) and
[http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/](http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/)
are not HTTPS?

~~~
harryf
How is it possible in this day that Microsoft is not able to provide a decent
SSH client for Windows?

~~~
tw04
They do... both native and via subsystem for linux.

~~~
harryf
If that's so why are we still using PuTYY / KiTTY (serious question)?

~~~
tw04
Well, I would guess first and foremost: why change? People that already use
putty probably have no desire to switch just to switch. If the alternative
isn't SIGNIFICANTLY better, most people aren't going to switch just to switch.

Second: not everyone is on Windows 10 which is a requirement for the Linux
subsystem.

I guess last but not least: in both cases they require installing software.
Some corporate users have no control over their own laptops. Putty has a
portable version that you don't have to install anything to use.

------
based2
[http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/](http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/)

