What is a "Secure Shell"? I had seen this term several times. I decided to check. It establishes a "secure connection" to another computer and runs a "shell," or terminal. I took a look at a screenshot. This brought back memories of the old terminals from the DOS days.

Let's see...text only, possibly color depending on the program on the other end, and no graphics. I had used the Terminal program that came with my iMac only a little. I had ran a Par2 utility prior to MacParDeluxe adding it to its list of features, a RAR command line utility for making RARs, and I did a few file management tasks on stubborn files. This was starting off looking too limited for this idea to be worthwhile. But how little did I know...

I couldn't think of much to do with the file management idea. Maybe to move some critically needed files to another place on the hard disk that I would have an easier time getting to with the web server function that I have running on my Mac, or perhaps for someone else for that matter. But how many people have a web (or ftp) server running on their home computer?

I next discovered the "open -a" command to open with a specified program and tried this:

open -a /Applications/Documents\ To\ Go.app /Users/davidransom/Documents/InternetDownloads/TerminalBasics.pdf

This line acts like a drag and drop for the file, "TerminalBasics.pdf". Now this was useful. I could send a pdf home with EzFTP, use open -a with Documents To Go to convert it to a Palm file, and then retrieve it. Tedious, but now possible. I tested this out since I have no native way to use .pdf's on a Palm.

Since this was getting better, I kept looking. Now a text editor. A program called Pico to do text editing was already installed on my iMac. Works, but why? Even the memo pad is more convenient than dealing with this. But I kept it in mind for later.

How about a text web browser? I found just such a program called Lynx (http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/unix_open_source/). It was fairly easy to use, although I found nothing all that special to it. This could help someone who is quite short on memory and not able to install a Palm web browser such as Eudora or Xiino.

The list was growing, but it would help if I could have more things going at once. Ask and you shall receive! Enter "screen". This program opens multiples terminal windows for you. Now it made more sense. A text editor like pico could be used to store information for the other windows. File and pathnames, bookmarks and new URLs, etc... Also, these terminals under screen can continue running if you get disconnected, so you resume them later if your connection is broken or if you simply decide to use a another computer.

I backed up for a moment. Just what did people typically use a secure shell for? I found several universities which offered access to their services by secure shell, in particular email. Email? Now that would useful, even as text. I tried an email program called "Pine" (http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/unix_open_source/). I struggled for three evenings to figure out the process of configuring this type of program. I never did it to get my mail, but I had managed to get it to send email out, and that part had had actually come quickly, in just minutes.

Send mail out. I had momentarily been stuck thinking what for...until the memories of being about an hour out of town and thinking, #*%$^, I forgot that ___ file. Now I had an answer for that. I could connect home by secure shell, then send the file out by email with Pine. This also takes care of the issue of the likelihood of most people not having/using a web server at home (as I mentioned earlier that I did). Not only that, the email went out at the desktop speed, which is DSL for me. I could send big files out while away, and without worrying about long connections of my Zodiac to the cell phone which would cost some $$.

I put the email idea to the test. I tried first with my mini Bluetooth network. I connected with a secure shell, started Pine, did a short email to name the attached file, attached the file, and sent it. In addition I switched to Mark Space Mail and downloaded my test file, a map from MapQuest, and then opened it in Acid Image Pro. The whole process took just less the 4 minutes. Of course this could be slowed down by problems such as a poor connection, but these little test results were excellent enough to retry with the cell phone. I did the same exact test, except for getting two map files instead of just one. With an IR connection to the cell phone it took just under 8 minutes. It is also possible to unzip and zip files. So you can unzip a large archive, get the file(s) you need and leave the rest behind when making a new zip with just the Palm files.

There are many more programs available to run in the terminal, so this is an idea with ongoing potential. I like that part. It also means that preparation needs to be done before leaving the desktop if you connect home. To do the testing of these ideas, I used pssh from here: http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/palm/7083

This is the starting screen for getting a new connection. The host is the web address, and the username your account login. The port was preset to 22. While I found the text readable, I definitely wanted a bigger size.

The only display setting that I changed was the one to the larger font that was much easier to read. Pssh says it is low security. As seen above the only part that was used was a password. The issue listed for this was the processing speed of the Palm, with the other methods needing too much, and would therefore significantly slow down logging in.

I can't imagine having many locations to log into, but the need was addressed. It remembers where you logged in for a later connection, like a bookmark. The text browser Lynx is shown here on the right, with color and highlighting.

I found pssh easy to use and it is free. There wasn't much to do on the Palm to be a problem, although my router needed to be configured to let the connection in on port 22. Unlike the desktop version of a secure shell, pssh doesn't do file transfers through the Terminal on the Palm the way it will on a desktop (it does not make such a claim either).

My copy of Fitaly for text entry did not work as smooth as I had hoped. Fitaly was slower than the built-in keyboard that can be displayed in pssh, and later it became completely unresponsive and I only used the keyboard in pssh.

I expect those who use Unix to already have a good idea of what programs they could think of to use. For the new people I have some starting ideas:

*file management - not just moving or copying, but the drag and drop via open -a to do a default conversion. Also unzipping and zipping.

*text editor - to keep copies of information something like a sticky pad.

*screen - to get the ability to multi-task, handle being interrupted and resuming later.

*text web browser - this works fast without graphics. Lynx was easy browse with.

*email - to send out files while away. Pine worked well.

Since this idea is one of potential, more tasks can be done than just those, and it does not cost any money to try this out.