Connecting via the PrivX GUI

To connect to targets via the PrivX GUI:

  1. Log into the PrivX GUI using your PrivX account.

  2. On the Home page under New Connection, provide target details (such as the target-host address) to receive suggestions about available targets, then select a target to connect to it. Your accessible targets are also listed and selectable on the Connections→Available Hosts page.

    You may alternatively go to Connections→Manual Connection page and manually specify your target. The user must have the connections-manual permission to use this method.

Connections via Connections→Available Hosts are authenticated according to the role-based rules and the enabled authentication methods. Connections via Connections→Manual Connection always prompt for password.

You may need to adjust locale settings for keyboard commands to be transferred correctly.

Quickly access a recent target from the Home page by clicking an entry under Recent connections, or on the Connections→Connection History page.

SSH GUI Usage

Open multiple terminals

  • On the tab bar, click + to open additional terminals.

Copy-paste

  • On a Mac, you can select text and use Command-C and Command-V to copy-paste, or right-click and use the context menu.

  • On a Windows or Linux you can select text and right-click to use the context menu. Alternatively you can select some text, then press Ctrl-C or Ctrl-Insert to copy. Paste using Ctrl-V or Shift-Insert.

To use applications that specifically require Ctrl-V for other things than pasting, enable Send Ctrl-V to server under terminal Settings. Enabling this setting also disables pasting with Ctrl-V.

  • On Chrome and Edge you can also use Ctrl-Shift-C to copy and Ctrl-Shift-V to paste.

  • The left Alt (option on a Mac) key also functions as the Meta key (for example in Emacs).

Find in terminal

Use the following commands to activate terminal-specific search:

  • On a Mac, use Command-F while focused in the terminal.

  • On Windows or Linux, use Ctrl-Shift-F while focused in the terminal.

Use arrow keys to navigate between next/previous matches. Press Esc or X to close the terminal-specific search.

Transfer files

The Files tab lets you:

  • Navigate through files on the target host.
  • Upload, download, and remove files.
  • Create, rename, move, and remove directories.

To change directory, click a directory or . You can perform additional actions on files via their ☰ menus.

  • To download a file: Double-click the file, or perform a Download action via its ☰ menu.

  • To upload a file: Drag-and-drop the file to the file-transfer view. Alternatively, click Upload next to the file-transfer view and select the local file to upload.

  • To create a new directory, click ☰ in the Current Directory field. The directory is created under the current directory.

  • To move, rename, or delete directories, click ☰ next to the target directory.

Change text, locale and theme

From the Settings tab, you can set the font size, character encoding, and the locale used for the connection. You can also switch between a dark and a light theme.

Open URLs

To open HTTP/HTTPS links in a new tab on Windows or Linux, hold Ctrl and double-click the link. To open links on Mac, hold Command and double-click.

RDP GUI Usage

Copy-paste

When clipboard synchronisation is enabled, you can directly copy-paste between your host and the target host.

Otherwise, place the text into the Clipboard tab, then paste normally on the target host. Text copied from the target host is automatically made available in the Clipboard.

To check clipboard-synchronisation support, and to toggle it on/off, see Settings.

Clipboard synchronisation is only available on Edge, Safari, and Chrome browsers.

Secrets from the RDP tab are automatically copied to the target host, regardless of clipboard-synchronization support.

Transfer files

Upon connecting, PrivX automatically mounts a network drive called Transfers on PrivX to the target host. File downloads and uploads must be performed via this network drive.

You can copy files from the target host to Transfers on PrivX, then download them from the Files tab. Similarly, you can upload files by placing them to Transfers on PrivX on the Files tab, then move the file to another location on the target host.

  • To download a file: Double-click the file, or perform a Download action via its ☰ menu.

  • To upload a file: Drag-and-drop the file to the file-transfer view. Alternatively, click Upload next to the file-transfer view and select the local file to upload.

  • To create a new directory, click ☰ in the Current Directory field. The directory is created under the current directory.

  • To move, rename, or delete directories, click ☰ next to the target directory.

Set keyboard layout

To change your keyboard layout, go to the Settings tab, select your layout, then restart the connection to apply the changes. Set this to match the keyboard layout defined for the server (not the client-side layout).

Fullscreen view

To toggle fullscreen view, click .

You may need to re-establish the RDP connection after changing the screen size.

Changing RDP Resolution

You can set the resolution using URL parameters.

For example, if your RDP connection opens to the address:
https://privx.example.com/privx/connections/rdp?
account=alice&target=192.0.2.100

You may set the resolution to 800x600 with:
https://privx.example.com/privx/connections/rdp?
account=alice&target=192.0.2.100&width=800&height=600

Send Special Commands

To send special commands such as Ctrl+Alt+Del, click Send Keys, then select the command to send.

Web GUI Usage

Copy-paste

When clipboard synchronisation is enabled, you can directly copy-paste between your host and the target host.

Otherwise, place the text into the Clipboard tab, then paste normally on the target host. Text copied from the target host is automatically made available in the Clipboard.

To check clipboard-synchronisation support, and to toggle it on/off, see Settings.

Clipboard synchronisation is only available on Edge, Safari, and Chrome browsers.

Secrets from the RDP tab are automatically copied to the target host, regardless of clipboard-synchronization support.

Transfer Files

Upon connecting, PrivX automatically synchronizes files between Files tab and Download folder of the web browser running in PrivX Carrier.

  • To download a file: Download the files normally with browser. After downloading in browser is completed, click on Files tab to locate the files and download them to your local computer.

  • To upload a file: Open Files tab, upload files from your local computer to PrivX files folder. Then click file upload link in web page. A file selector view is opened, select files to proceed uploading to the web server.

Files in Download folder of web browser are stored in PrivX Web-Carrier host. Monitor the storage usage in the host.

Set keyboard layout

To change your keyboard layout, go to the Settings tab, select your layout, then restart the connection to apply the changes. Set this to match the keyboard layout defined for the server (not the client-side layout).

Fullscreen view

To toggle fullscreen view, click .

Tips to set the correct keyboard layout

You may find the keys accepted in RDP and web connections do not match the keyboard you are typing. You may try following tips to resolve the issue:

  • When using RDP, set the correct language and keyboard layout on the target server.
  • In PrivX GUI, go to the Settings tab and set language to General Unicode if you want to use the exact keyboard layout of your local computer.
  • If you are a macOS user, set the keyboard of your local computer to Unicode and set the target language in PrivX GUI. Then the keyboard will generally follow the layout documented by List of QWERTY language variants.
  • If you are a Linux user, set the correct keyboard layout on your local computer and General Unicode in the PrivX GUI. Using the target language in PrivX GUI may work, but some modifier key combinations may malfunction.

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