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Using Visual Studio Code on Windows to log in to a PYNQ board with SSH FS

The SSH FS vscode extension by Kelvin Schoofs is a simpler SSH extension than the standard Remote - SSH extension by Microsoft. It has the advantage of being more stable than the standard extension, which runs applications remotely on the PYNQ for which it has insufficient processing power.

Follows the instructions below to install it in vscode and connect to the PYNQ board.

The first to steps, installing the extension and configuring the connection only need to be performed once. The last step, connecting to the board, every time you use the board.

Install the SSH FS Extension

  1. Open VS Code.
  2. Open the Extensions view (Ctrl+Shift+X).
  3. Search for SSH FS.
  4. Install SSH FS by Kelvin Schoofs.

Configure the Connection

  1. Open the Command Palette (Ctrl+Shift+P).
  2. Run:
SSH FS: Create a SSH FS Configuration
  1. Enter the following information:
Name: pynq
Location: Global settings.json

Click Save

  1. Enter the following information leaving all other fields as they are:
Host: 10.43.0.1
Port: 22
Username: student
Password: student

Click Save

Connect to the PYNQ board

ℹ️ Note Make sure that the PYNQ board is connected to the laptop before proceeding with the next steps.

Adding the PYNQ file system to the workspace

  1. On the Activity Bar, select the icon for the SSH FS extension
  2. Under Configurations next to the configuration pynq, click the icon labelled Add as workspace folder (a folder icon with a + sign).

Under the Explorer tab of the Activity Bar, you should now see the files on the filesystem of the PYNQ board.

The files can be opened and edited in vscode as usual. Navigate to /home/student/pynq-io-library/applications to see a list of folders with C programs.

Opening a terminal on the PYNQ board

  1. On the Activity Bar, select the icon for the SSH FS extension
  2. Under Configurations next to the configuration pynq, click the icon labelled Open remote SSH terminal (a terminal/console icon).

This opens a terminal connection to the PYNQ board. On the panel, typically at the bottom of the screen, you should see a tab labelled Terminal with the following text.

Connecting to pynq...
student@pynq:~$

After the prompt, you can type commands to be run on the system on the PYNQ board. Try e.g., ls, or pwd.