Some useful tips on using SSH

Setup a `~/.ssh/config`

The SSH Config file has the following format

Host hostname1
    SSH_OPTION value
    SSH_OPTION value

Host hostname2
    SSH_OPTION value

Host *
    SSH_OPTION value

Instead of connecting like this everytime,

$ ssh john@dev.example.com -p 2322

You can setup your ssh config -

Host devbox
    HostName dev.example.com
    User john
    Port 2322

And then only write

$ ssh devbox

Other programs like scp, sftp, rsync will also pull this config automatically so you can use the same aliases there as well.

scp some/path/to/local/file remotehostname:/destination/on/remote/box

If you have set up an ssh alias like mentioned above, you can use that before the : in the destination path.

Use the following syntax -

$ ssh remotebox "some command you want to run"

For eg.

$ ssh remotebox "date"
Sun Mar  1 02:29:25 PM IST 2026