Remotely run script on Unix, get output locally?

This is the default for SSH. If you want to redirect output remotely, put the redirect symbol (typically ">") inside the command quotes.

For example:

ssh remote_host "ls > /tmp/file_on_remote_host.txt"

For saving output locally on Windows host,

ssh remote_host "ls" > .\file_on_local_host.txt

To combine stderr remotely and save it and stdout locally,

ssh remote_host "ls 2>&1" > .\combined_output_on_local_host.txt

What I was looking for is putty's side-kick, plink.exe. Unlike putty, which acts like a terminal emulator, plink acts like a normal (non-interactive) CLI program.

Using it, I could do this in cmd.exe and get the remote command output saved locally.

\> plink remote_host "ls -l" > log.txt

Best of all, this works for ssh as well as telnet !

Just for reference purposes, these are the available options:

PuTTY Link: command-line connection utility
Release 0.59
Usage: plink [options] [user@]host [command]
       ("host" can also be a PuTTY saved session name)
Options:
  -V        print version information and exit
  -pgpfp    print PGP key fingerprints and exit
  -v        show verbose messages
  -load sessname  Load settings from saved session
  -ssh -telnet -rlogin -raw
            force use of a particular protocol
  -P port   connect to specified port
  -l user   connect with specified username
  -batch    disable all interactive prompts
The following options only apply to SSH connections:
  -pw passw login with specified password
  -D [listen-IP:]listen-port
            Dynamic SOCKS-based port forwarding
  -L [listen-IP:]listen-port:host:port
            Forward local port to remote address
  -R [listen-IP:]listen-port:host:port
            Forward remote port to local address
  -X -x     enable / disable X11 forwarding
  -A -a     enable / disable agent forwarding
  -t -T     enable / disable pty allocation
  -1 -2     force use of particular protocol version
  -4 -6     force use of IPv4 or IPv6
  -C        enable compression
  -i key    private key file for authentication
  -noagent  disable use of Pageant
  -agent    enable use of Pageant
  -m file   read remote command(s) from file
  -s        remote command is an SSH subsystem (SSH-2 only)
  -N        don't start a shell/command (SSH-2 only)
  -nc host:port
            open tunnel in place of session (SSH-2 only)

Yes if you use the putty ssh client you will see any command line output your script will produce. To get the exit code after the script runs type:

echo $?