SR OS supports opening up to five channels per SSH connection. SSH channels can be used when an SSH connection has authenticated a user and a channel is opened for configuration while another channel is required to retrieve state information, such as collecting configurations or show command output. In this case, some network managers attempt to set up an additional channel in the existing SSH connection.
Opening a new channel inside an existing authenticated SSH connection mitigates the additional time and memory requirements for establishing a new SSH session. This mitigation is useful when, for example, multiple RPCs from different network manager users to the same device are executed at the same time.
Multiple channels are only supported for SSH and some applications that use SSH as transport. Multiple channels are not supported for SFTP or SCP.