GSI-OpenSSH, GSI-SCP, and GSI-SFTP

OpenSSH is a popular open source tool for remote login and file transfer to and from Unix systems. Unlike earlier Internet tools (telnet, rlogin, rsh, rcp, etc.), OpenSSH uses public keys to authenticate login and file transfer requests. The standard version of OpenSSH does not, however, support Grid authentication.

GSI-OpenSSH is a version of OpenSSH that supports Grid authentication, allowing people who already have Grid certificates to use these tools without establishing another set of keys. Services include remote login (gsi-ssh), remote copy (gsi-scp), and secure FTP (gsi-sftp).

Although these programs do not provide the high-performance benefits of GridFTP servers and clients, they are are more familiar to many users and thus may be attractive to projects that are migrating applications and users to Grid environments.

GSI-OpenSSH is implemented as a patch to the standard OpenSSH distribution.