3.8.1 Starting a session from the command line These options allow you to bypass the configuration window and launch straight into a session. To start a connection to a server called host:
putty.exe [-ssh | -telnet | -rlogin | -raw] [user@]host
If this syntax is used, settings are taken from the Default Settings (see section 4.1.2
); user overrides these settings if supplied. Also, you can specify a protocol, which will override the default protocol (see section 3.8.3.2
). For telnet sessions, the following alternative syntax is supported (this makes PuTTY suitable for use as a URL handler for telnet URLs in web browsers): putty.exe telnet://host[:port]/
To start a connection to a serial port, e.g. COM1:
putty.exe -serial com1
In order to start an existing saved session called sessionname, use the -load option (described in section 3.8.3.1
). putty.exe -load "session name"
If invoked with the -cleanup option, rather than running as normal, PuTTY will remove its registry entries and random seed file from the local machine (after confirming with the user). Note that on multi-user systems, -cleanup only removes registry entries and files associated with the currently logged-in user. 3.8.3 Standard command-line options PuTTY and its associated tools support a range of command-line options, most of which are consistent across all the tools. This section lists the available options in all tools. Options which are specific to a particular tool are covered in the chapter about that tool.