ECE429 Lab1: Remote Lab Access Guide

Updated by Jia Wang, May 2011; Revised by Ken Choi, Sep 2014; Updated, Sep 2019; Updated, Jan 2021;

DISCLAIMER

Please read this documentation completely before continuing. The softwares may ask you to disable your anti-virus software during installation -- you will not be protected from viruses in such situation. Use this document at your own risk. IIT disclaims any liability for any actions or results of the following this documentation.

Since network failure may interrupt your operation, please save your data often.

Available Servers

Currently, we have two servers available for use. (saturn.ece.iit.edu and uranus.ece.iit.edu) If you already have been assigned an account for ECE related courses, you can use your account to log on either server.

Starting Spring 2021, Remote Desktop Connection must be connected via IIT VPN connection if you are outside of Illinois Tech Network. Go to this link.

If you are inside of Illinois Tech Network, skip to the next Putty step.

Command Line Access by PuTTY

PuTTY is a free SSH client software that you can use to connect to UNIX servers and to execute commands there.
Download here for Windows

You can run the downloaded putty.exe file directly without installation. However, you need to setup necessary information (called 'session') so it will know where the UNIX server is located. Please setup your session for one of the UNIX server saturn.ece.iit.edu/uranus.ece.iit.edu according to the following steps.

  1. Click on Session
  2. Put saturn.ece.iit.edu in Host Name (you can also use uranus.ece.iit.edu here)
  3. Give the session a name (saturn)
  4. Click Save to save your session

Now, after double click saturn in the saved session list, you probably will see a dialog box with the title 'PuTTY Security Alert'. Click Yes and most likely it won't appear again. Then you'll see a window asking for your login name.

After input your login name and then password, you are connected to vulcan and are able to execute commands, e.g. ls.

GUI Access by VNC over SSH Tunnels

The ECE department is currently maintaining a list of methods that enable one to access the graphic user interface of UNIX servers remotely with proper server-side support. For our class, we strongly recommend the methods that establish VNC connections over SSH tunnels. They save a lot of bandwidth when there are a lot of things to display and if a network failure happens, you can simply reconnect without losing any unsaved job (but don't rely on this, save your data often!).

If your computer runs a Windows system, please follow 8)VNC using Microsoft's Remote Desktop Connection-For Windows - Highly Recommended . Note that if you cannot establish the connection, you may need to allow the VNC Tunnel program installed on your desktop to visit the network in your firewalls and to run the program as an Administrator. Otherwise, please follow 6) VNC using SSH Tunnel Configuration Guide - FOR LINUX .