Data transfer with FileZilla#

FileZilla is a free and easy-to-use FTP-style program to transfer files to and from your VSC account on the clusters.

You can download FileZilla from the FileZilla project page.

Prerequisites#

All users need to setup an SSH agent before proceeding.

You need to get an SSH certificate into your agent, if you haven’t done so already.

You need to load your private SSH key into your SSH agent.

Configuration of FileZilla to connect to a login node#

  1. Start FileZilla

  2. Open the Site Manager using the ‘File’ menu

  3. Create a new site by clicking the ‘New Site’ button

  4. In the tab marked ‘General’, enter the following values (all other fields remain blank):

    • Host: login.hpc.kuleuven.be

    • Server Type: ‘SFTP - SSH File Transer Protocol’

    • Logon Type: ‘Interactive’

    • User: your own VSC user ID

      FileZilla's site manager for KU Leuven clusters

    • Host: fill in the hostname of the VSC login node of your home institution. You can find this information in the overview of available hardware on this site.

    • Server Type: ‘SFTP - SSH File Transfer Protocol’

    • Logon Type: ‘Normal’

    • User: your own VSC user ID, e.g. vsc98765

      FileZilla's site manager for UGent, VUB, UAntwerpen

  5. Optionally, rename this setting to your liking by pressing the ‘Rename’ button

  6. Press ‘Connect’ and enter your passphrase when requested

As long as your SSH agent is running and keeping a valid SSH certificate, you stay connected via FileZilla and you do not require additional configuration.

Recent versions of FileZilla have a screen in the settings to manage private keys. The path to the private key must be provided in options (Edit Tab -> options -> connection -> SFTP):

FileZilla site manager with settings

After that you should be able to connect after being asked for passphrase. As an alternative you can choose to use an SSH agent.

Under the ‘Advanced’ tab you can also set the directory you wish to open by default upon login. For example, to set your default path to your VSC_DATA directory, you need to provide the full path, like /data/brussels/1xx/vsc1xxxxx.