Today, we’ll look at using scp to copy files from one machine to another on a local network. Even though scp is hardened and encrypted be sure to practice appropriate security measures when venturing past the safety of your firewalled local-area network. I used to scp files from my Linux notebook up to my GoDaddy web site. Scp on the open internet works fine, since ssh works there too, considering the above-mentioned requirements. To use scp you simply need to have an operational ssh server on your remote machine and an ssh client running on the machine you are using, such as your Linux notebook. We discussed working with ssh in a recent TNS article. If ssh is installed, you’ll probably already have scp as well.

Scp is part of the SSH family of remote network access services, native to Linux/Unix operating systems.

Since all my machines are Linux based, the easiest way to do it is with the scp command. It might be sound files for my robotic skull’s voice (on a Raspberry Pi), screenshot graphics captured for a tech article or any number of text configuration files. I occasionally need to copy files between computers on my local network.

Copy files between two linux servers