Comparison · vs SSH clients
RemoteD vs PuTTY, Terminal, and iTerm2.
SSH clients open terminals. RemoteD is the workspace around them — connection inventory, customer-site organization, network discovery, port maps, field companion, and customer-ready reports.
- You only need a fast terminal for ad-hoc SSH sessions.
- You manage your own machines, not customer sites.
- You do not need cross-session context — no port maps, no topology, no inventory across customers.
- You are happy storing connection strings in shell config or your head.
If that is your workflow, you do not need RemoteD. PuTTY, Terminal, and iTerm2 are excellent at being terminals.
A connection inventory, not a shell history
Customer / site / folder organization with search, drag/drop, multi-select, bulk credential edits, and reachability status. Sessions inherit the context the folder gives them.
Credentials live in macOS Keychain
Passwords for SSH, RDP, VNC, and Telnet go through Electron safeStorage / macOS Keychain — not text files, not shell history, not pasted into terminals.
Network discovery surfaces alongside sessions
LLDP neighbor discovery, ARP lookups, subnet scanning, and firmware/device detection feed the topology view and port maps. The terminal is one tab; the inventory is another.
Field companion + report exports
Pair an iPhone to the desktop for Find Port by MAC/IP and field notes. Export folder PDFs / HTML for the customer when the visit is done. A terminal does not do either.
Feature comparison
Where the lines fall.
Specifics vary by client — iTerm2 has profiles and split panes; PuTTY is Windows-first; macOS Terminal is minimal. The shape below is the common ground.
| Feature | RemoteD | Standalone SSH client |
|---|---|---|
SSH / Telnet / Serial sessions | Yes | Yes |
RDP and VNC launchers Terminals are SSH-shaped; RemoteD launches RDP and macOS Screen Sharing too. | Yes | No |
Connection inventory (folders, search, bulk edit) iTerm2 has profiles but no folder/site organization. | Yes | No |
Credential storage | macOS Keychain | Manual / ssh-agent / config files |
Network discovery (LLDP, ARP, subnet scan) | Yes | No |
Topology view | Yes | No |
Visual port maps | Yes | No |
Field companion (iOS) | Yes | No |
Multi-customer organization | Yes | No |
PDF / HTML report exports | Yes | No |
File transfer (SFTP, TFTP, HTTP) Standalone clients usually do SFTP; built-in TFTP and HTTP transfer servers are RemoteD-specific. | Yes | Partial |
Workflows + command artifacts | Yes | No |
Next step
Keep the terminal you love. Get the workspace around it.
RemoteD ships xterm.js inside the same app that holds your inventory, topology, port maps, and customer reports.