Biola University Computer Science

Server Resources

Tutorials and resources

How to upload or download files to your account on the OS X server using FileZilla

FileZilla is already installed in Metzger 100 and is also available for download and installation from FileZilla website
Use the File-Site Manager option of FileZilla to set up the OS X server as a new site to connect: Set the host as compsci.biola.edu, use the port number 22 and pick the server type: SFTP using SSH, then provide your account username and password.
After the setup, under the Site Manager press the connect button to connect to your account on the OS X server. When the connection is successfully established, you can navigate through the directory structures of your accounts on your local computer and the X server to freely upload and download files through FileZilla.

The URLs of your web pages on OS X server

The Sites folder of your OS X account has the URL http://compsci.biola.edu/~YourUserName. Accordingly you can access a web page YourPage.htm under the Sites folder of your OS X account as: //compsci.biola.edu/~YourUserName/YourPage.htm.

How to connect to the MySQL server on the OS X server through phpMyAdmin

As a very handy alternative to using the mysql client program to interact (through the command line) with the MySQL server, phpMyAdmin is written in PHP to provide a convenient web interface to interact with the MySQL server. We have phpMyAdmin installed on the OS X server and you can do all the MySQL tasks by interacting with the MySQL server installed on the OS X server through phpMyAdmin. (phpMyAdmin is available for download and installation from phpMyAdmin website.)
You can get to the phpMyAdmin installed on the OS X server by http://compsci.biola.edu/mysql/. Provide your username and password through the web interface to connect to the MySQL server on the OS X server. Two empty databases test and YourUserName are already created there and you can create addition tables in them.

How to use PuTTY to log into the OS X server and work with the server as a UNIX environment

The OS X server is in its essence a UNIX clone, and at times it is useful to log in and intheract with it theough the command line. You can od this by using PuTTY. You can download PuTTY from the PuTTY website and double click on the downloaded executable to run it.
PuTTY's interface looks pretty much like that of the Site Manager of FileZilla, which you have played with above. You can set up the connection to the OS X server under PuTTY almost like what you have done under the Site Manager of FileZilla. After providing your username and password, you can then log into the OS X server and work with it through the command line.

After loginning into the OS X server, how to talk to the MySQL server and use other Unix commands.

You can use the mysql client program to connect to the mysql server installed on the OS X server by the command: mysql –u yourUserName –p . This should allow you to connect to the MySQL server installed on the OS X machine.
For more on Unix commands to interact with the server through PuTTY, read this UNIX tutorial (Physics Dept, U. of Edinburgh).
You can also use the command: man nameOfCommand to get the details of the commmands.

Useful online references: