4 ms·

Snowflake: Graphical SFTP client and terminal emulator with helpful utilities

103 points by tomerbd 7y ago

slantyyz 7y ago
I just installed it, it's nice. The UI is simple ("webby" is how I'd describe it), and it seems adequately responsive. Being able to switch between the file browser and terminal is very handy. The one thing I would like to see is the ability to set the editor for the remote files instead of relying on my system defaults. I'm not quite sure it's ready to replace WinSCP for me yet, but I'll definitely give it a chance and see how it goes.
sam_goody 7y ago
For Windows and Linux. Am on a Mac so cannot test, but what is the advantage of this over WinSCP, Filezilla and Cyberduck (IIRC the "old guard" FOSS SCP clients)?
- tomerbd 7y ago
  on mac you can use it with 'java -jar snowflake.jar'
  - qorrect 7y ago
    It works great on mac, I'm really enjoying this tool.
  - tinus_hn 7y ago
    I don’t think Java is on a Mac by default anymore.
- oldandboring 7y ago
  According to the README it's not just an SFTP client, it's providing a combined UI for various remote operations, all executed over SSH. Text editing, system resource monitoring of the remote host (eg. disk space, CPU, locating files), as well as a terminal emulator for good old shell usage. Seems pretty nifty to me, to have all that in one place.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
alvarezo 7y ago
Java. Nuff said.
- beart 7y ago
  You're gonna have to say more because I don't understand.
  - sk0g 7y ago
    "Java bad" is the best you're going to get, I'm guessing. Looks like a pretty handy tool IMO, and Java beats Electron for me, so not sure what the issue is.
    - tracker1 7y ago
      I find electron apps generally look and interact better... though this app looks decent. I've been using the Remote SSH extension for VS Code as a remote editor across ssh, which has worked phenominally well for me.
  - alvarezo 7y ago
    Sorry, I thought it was quite self-evident, although probably mostly for people having to use this technology. I don't want to get into flame wars or extensive argumentation but from my personal experience dealing with Java in the past, both from the application user's side as well as development side has been such a pain. It was a complete bloatware package, slow and ugly, RAM hungry, disk I/O hungry. Even the java.com website is ugly as hell and not changed during the last 15 years. Doesn't really increase confidence for improved experience.
    - slantyyz 7y ago
      I think it depends on the developer more than the platform. On the enterprise side, I've seen a lot of hot garbage. But I've also seen a lot of good stuff. DBVisualizer, while not having the prettiest interface, is a pretty fast and functional application built on Java.
    - 7y ago
djmobley 7y ago
Not a great choice of name given the existence of https://www.snowflake.com https://www.snowflake.com
- masswerk 7y ago
  Coincidentally, it's also the name of a famous, early graphics demo (1960s), compare https://www.masswerk.at/snowflake https://www.masswerk.at/snowflake (URL redirects to an emulation on the same site).
  - zwirbl 7y ago
    those are awesome! thanks for the link
  - BuildTheRobots 7y ago
    CuriousMark has a PDP11 video that has some of these demos running on the original hardware: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EWQYAfuMYw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EWQYAfuMYw His videos are surprisingly addictive; they've restored an Apollo guidance computer, Altos and tonnes of other ancient kit.
    - masswerk 7y ago
      I'm actually a great fan, highly recommended!
- danpalmer 7y ago
  Or https://snowflakesoftware.com/ https://snowflakesoftware.com/
- zamadatix 7y ago
  You could write an entire OS single handedly, name it via a password generator, and one of the comments on HN would be how the name is still somewhat similar to <x> instead of talking about the project.
GordonS 7y ago
Looks decent at a glance, but like many people, I've been using WinSCP for several years and would need solid reasons to switch - I'd really like to see a comparison to WinSCP in the readme.
- slantyyz 7y ago
  From what I gather from my initial use of the tool, I think the main advantage of this tool is reduced window proliferation. You basically have a bunch of commonly used tools that exist in one window (file browser client, terminal, rudimentary text/log viewers, etc.) Depending on your preferences, this might have a lot of value if you're constrained by screen real estate (i.e., laptop users).
- pnutjam 7y ago
  This is alot more powerful then winscp. I might compare it more closely to MobaXterm, but that is build with more of a terminal mindset. Snowflake seems to be built with more of a gui mindset. It seems pretty useful for intermediate level system admin work or developers.
wwn_se 7y ago
seems nice at first glance at least
_def 7y ago
Is it possible to define jump hosts? edit: if not, does someone know a decent software alike which supports this, for macos?
- pnutjam 7y ago
  Doesn't the mac console support jumphosts? ssh -J
  - _def 7y ago
    Yes, of course. But I'd be happier to be able to manage this in a combined GUI (like snowflake) as well.
    - pnutjam 7y ago
      I've found that some graphical systems will pull config from your .ssh/config You might try it and see if anything you use works with that.
zamadatix 7y ago
Mixing SFTP for file transfer with raw commands for remote file operations seems like an interesting concept. Are there other tools which have done this?
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- kweks 7y ago
  MobaXterm comes to mind as an incredibly complete solution in this niche. Possibly one of the only pieces of software that I enjoy paying yearly fees for.
tracker1 7y ago
For a similar workflow, at least for terminal and editor, is the Remote SSH extension for VS Code... really been enjoying it for a one-off server that is running on a VPS. I haven't tried dragging or pasting into the file section (which works on local resources), so can't confirm file transfers actually work.
- sam_goody 7y ago
  Except that VScode runs a Node on port 3000 of your server, and doesn't care if you already _have_ a node server on port 3000. Easy to solve once you find out why, but when some dev connects with VSCode and the production server goes down... not impressed.
  - tracker1 7y ago
    I'm pretty sure you're mistaken... I ran the following locally and on the remote system and not seeing anything on port 3000 sudo lsof -i -P -n | egrep -i '\b3000\b.+LISTEN' https://i.imgur.com/wcCTdLQ.jpg https://i.imgur.com/wcCTdLQ.jpg https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=ms-vscode-remote.remote-ssh https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=ms-vscod...
Fnoord 7y ago
How does it compare to Cyberduck?
JdeBP 7y ago
It incorporates JEDIterm, a reworked version of JCTerm and GriTTY, apparently. But the default terminal type that it passes over SSH is "xterm-256color". It is, of course, not identical to XTerm. * https://invisible-island.net/ncurses/ncurses.faq.html#xterm_generic https://invisible-island.net/ncurses/ncurses.faq.html#xterm_... * http://jdebp.uk./Softwares/nosh/guide/commands/TERM.xml#MIS-CONFIGURATION http://jdebp.uk./Softwares/nosh/guide/commands/TERM.xml#MIS-...
CloudBuddy 7y ago
This is very useful. Note though that all of the following doesn't work unless you have ssh access to the server: - search - terminal - monitoring (cpu & memory) - report of used/available disk space - system information
subhra74 7y ago
Hi, Snowflake author here. The main difference between Snowflake and WinScp or Cyberduck or Putty is that they are built mostly for a single task, either file transfer or terminal emulation. Where Snowflake can do both and more. Purpose is to provide a friendly GUI for common tasks, like killing processes, or rename with sudo. Its kind of similar to web based admin panels like webmin or ajenti, though they are more tend to be used for veteran sysadmins. But these admin panels needs to be configured and installed on the server, where snowflake works from the local computer without any configuration or installation on server side. More details can be found on: https://dev.to/subhra74/how-to-make-you-life-easier-on-remote-linux-servers-ssh-g7m https://dev.to/subhra74/how-to-make-you-life-easier-on-remot...
lucidphreak 7y ago
didnt work for me... I can connect all day long to some personal servers I have via filezilla (port 21) and in snowflake I just get a spinner and then it fails (and I do modify the port)... I WANT this to work as I like it.. but so far no bueno. Anyone else with this same issue?
- subhra74 7y ago
  you are using ftp (file transfer protocol). Snowflake works with ssh/sftp servers.

103 points by tomerbd 7y ago

I just installed it, it's nice. The UI is simple ("webby" is how I'd describe it), and it seems adequately responsive. Being able to switch between the file browser and terminal is very handy. The one thing I would like to see is the ability to set the editor for the remote files instead of relying on my system defaults. I'm not quite sure it's ready to replace WinSCP for me yet, but I'll definitely give it a chance and see how it goes.

sam_goody 7y ago

For Windows and Linux. Am on a Mac so cannot test, but what is the advantage of this over WinSCP, Filezilla and Cyberduck (IIRC the "old guard" FOSS SCP clients)?

tomerbd 7y ago
on mac you can use it with 'java -jar snowflake.jar'
- qorrect 7y ago
  It works great on mac, I'm really enjoying this tool.
- tinus_hn 7y ago
  I don’t think Java is on a Mac by default anymore.
oldandboring 7y ago
According to the README it's not just an SFTP client, it's providing a combined UI for various remote operations, all executed over SSH. Text editing, system resource monitoring of the remote host (eg. disk space, CPU, locating files), as well as a terminal emulator for good old shell usage. Seems pretty nifty to me, to have all that in one place.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]

alvarezo 7y ago

Java. Nuff said.

beart 7y ago
You're gonna have to say more because I don't understand.
- sk0g 7y ago
  "Java bad" is the best you're going to get, I'm guessing. Looks like a pretty handy tool IMO, and Java beats Electron for me, so not sure what the issue is.
  - tracker1 7y ago
    I find electron apps generally look and interact better... though this app looks decent. I've been using the Remote SSH extension for VS Code as a remote editor across ssh, which has worked phenominally well for me.
- alvarezo 7y ago
  Sorry, I thought it was quite self-evident, although probably mostly for people having to use this technology. I don't want to get into flame wars or extensive argumentation but from my personal experience dealing with Java in the past, both from the application user's side as well as development side has been such a pain. It was a complete bloatware package, slow and ugly, RAM hungry, disk I/O hungry. Even the java.com website is ugly as hell and not changed during the last 15 years. Doesn't really increase confidence for improved experience.
  - slantyyz 7y ago
    I think it depends on the developer more than the platform. On the enterprise side, I've seen a lot of hot garbage. But I've also seen a lot of good stuff. DBVisualizer, while not having the prettiest interface, is a pretty fast and functional application built on Java.
  - 7y ago

djmobley 7y ago

Not a great choice of name given the existence of https://www.snowflake.com https://www.snowflake.com

masswerk 7y ago
Coincidentally, it's also the name of a famous, early graphics demo (1960s), compare https://www.masswerk.at/snowflake https://www.masswerk.at/snowflake (URL redirects to an emulation on the same site).
- zwirbl 7y ago
  those are awesome! thanks for the link
- BuildTheRobots 7y ago
  CuriousMark has a PDP11 video that has some of these demos running on the original hardware: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EWQYAfuMYw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EWQYAfuMYw His videos are surprisingly addictive; they've restored an Apollo guidance computer, Altos and tonnes of other ancient kit.
  - masswerk 7y ago
    I'm actually a great fan, highly recommended!
danpalmer 7y ago
Or https://snowflakesoftware.com/ https://snowflakesoftware.com/
zamadatix 7y ago
You could write an entire OS single handedly, name it via a password generator, and one of the comments on HN would be how the name is still somewhat similar to <x> instead of talking about the project.

GordonS 7y ago

Looks decent at a glance, but like many people, I've been using WinSCP for several years and would need solid reasons to switch - I'd really like to see a comparison to WinSCP in the readme.

slantyyz 7y ago
From what I gather from my initial use of the tool, I think the main advantage of this tool is reduced window proliferation. You basically have a bunch of commonly used tools that exist in one window (file browser client, terminal, rudimentary text/log viewers, etc.) Depending on your preferences, this might have a lot of value if you're constrained by screen real estate (i.e., laptop users).
pnutjam 7y ago
This is alot more powerful then winscp. I might compare it more closely to MobaXterm, but that is build with more of a terminal mindset. Snowflake seems to be built with more of a gui mindset. It seems pretty useful for intermediate level system admin work or developers.

wwn_se 7y ago

seems nice at first glance at least

_def 7y ago

Is it possible to define jump hosts? edit: if not, does someone know a decent software alike which supports this, for macos?

pnutjam 7y ago
Doesn't the mac console support jumphosts? ssh -J
- _def 7y ago
  Yes, of course. But I'd be happier to be able to manage this in a combined GUI (like snowflake) as well.
  - pnutjam 7y ago
    I've found that some graphical systems will pull config from your .ssh/config You might try it and see if anything you use works with that.

zamadatix 7y ago

Mixing SFTP for file transfer with raw commands for remote file operations seems like an interesting concept. Are there other tools which have done this?

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
kweks 7y ago
MobaXterm comes to mind as an incredibly complete solution in this niche. Possibly one of the only pieces of software that I enjoy paying yearly fees for.

tracker1 7y ago

For a similar workflow, at least for terminal and editor, is the Remote SSH extension for VS Code... really been enjoying it for a one-off server that is running on a VPS. I haven't tried dragging or pasting into the file section (which works on local resources), so can't confirm file transfers actually work.

sam_goody 7y ago
Except that VScode runs a Node on port 3000 of your server, and doesn't care if you already _have_ a node server on port 3000. Easy to solve once you find out why, but when some dev connects with VSCode and the production server goes down... not impressed.
- tracker1 7y ago
  I'm pretty sure you're mistaken... I ran the following locally and on the remote system and not seeing anything on port 3000 sudo lsof -i -P -n | egrep -i '\b3000\b.+LISTEN' https://i.imgur.com/wcCTdLQ.jpg https://i.imgur.com/wcCTdLQ.jpg https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=ms-vscode-remote.remote-ssh https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=ms-vscod...

Fnoord 7y ago

How does it compare to Cyberduck?

JdeBP 7y ago

It incorporates JEDIterm, a reworked version of JCTerm and GriTTY, apparently. But the default terminal type that it passes over SSH is "xterm-256color". It is, of course, not identical to XTerm. * https://invisible-island.net/ncurses/ncurses.faq.html#xterm_generic https://invisible-island.net/ncurses/ncurses.faq.html#xterm_... * http://jdebp.uk./Softwares/nosh/guide/commands/TERM.xml#MIS-CONFIGURATION http://jdebp.uk./Softwares/nosh/guide/commands/TERM.xml#MIS-...

CloudBuddy 7y ago

This is very useful. Note though that all of the following doesn't work unless you have ssh access to the server: - search - terminal - monitoring (cpu & memory) - report of used/available disk space - system information

subhra74 7y ago

Hi, Snowflake author here. The main difference between Snowflake and WinScp or Cyberduck or Putty is that they are built mostly for a single task, either file transfer or terminal emulation. Where Snowflake can do both and more. Purpose is to provide a friendly GUI for common tasks, like killing processes, or rename with sudo. Its kind of similar to web based admin panels like webmin or ajenti, though they are more tend to be used for veteran sysadmins. But these admin panels needs to be configured and installed on the server, where snowflake works from the local computer without any configuration or installation on server side. More details can be found on: https://dev.to/subhra74/how-to-make-you-life-easier-on-remote-linux-servers-ssh-g7m https://dev.to/subhra74/how-to-make-you-life-easier-on-remot...

lucidphreak 7y ago

didnt work for me... I can connect all day long to some personal servers I have via filezilla (port 21) and in snowflake I just get a spinner and then it fails (and I do modify the port)... I WANT this to work as I like it.. but so far no bueno. Anyone else with this same issue?

subhra74 7y ago
you are using ftp (file transfer protocol). Snowflake works with ssh/sftp servers.