0
1
For my servers I'm currently using Google Authenticator for 2-Factor Authentication over SSH and it works as it should. One issue that I have is that trying to connecting to my servers over SFTP using something like Filezilla results in a weird behaviour. When I start transferring files in either direction the server starts asking me to input my verification code for each independent connection and there is no end to them really.
I know that this is to be expected, but I've been locking down max amount of connections to a single connection in order to tackle this, but I also found out that I can transfer multiple files over a single connection by using multiplexing. I've looked through the configuration of Filezilla but can't find anything about it so I'm humbly asking if anyone of you have any experience in multiplexed SFTP transfers or can point me towards a SFTP program that has support for it.
Thanks!
Sven
Posted 2015-07-03T15:32:26.853
Reputation: 153
I assume that by 'multiplexing' you mean that you're trying to transfer multiple files concurrently over the one connection. If so, I have to ask, what you are hoping to achieve by doing this? It can't be any faster. I suggest transferring them sequentially. Oh, a question for you, if you don't mind - which server are you using? – HansA – 2015-07-10T07:18:40.387
I'm sorry, but starting with 'Did you even read the question' is very aggressive. It's ridiculous to claim that it isn't. – HansA – 2015-07-22T01:14:19.967
In that case I have to apologize, was not my intention to sound aggressive. In response to your first comment, I'm using the built-in ssh server in Ubuntu. – Sven – 2015-07-22T01:18:04.127
Thank you. I just reread your question. No offense, but it's not really very clear. I thought you were using the word 'multiplexing' to describe transferring multiple files concurrently over a single connection, but I guess that's not correct. Could you please expand on what you mean? – HansA – 2015-07-22T02:33:04.997
That's exactly what I meant. I need to transfer multiple files concurrently over a single connection because the ssh server prompts for password and secret key (two-factor auth app on my phone) for each sequential connection. Right now I only open a single connection, and thus only being able to transfer one file at a time. I've heard that using multiplexing I can tackle this single transfer issue and still be able to transfer multiple files over that single connection, so I'm only prompted for password and secret key once. Hopefully I managed to describe it more clearly – Sven – 2015-07-22T02:37:20.567
If I can just confirm what you're asking: you've found that if you transfer files one-at-a-time then you're prompted to reauthenticate before each transfer, but you believe that if you can get all transfers going concurrently (on a single connection) then you'll only be asked to authenticate once (at the beginning). Is that right? The first part seems very strange to me. I would've thought that if you've configured FileZilla to use only one connection then it wouldn't need to reauthenticate regardless of how many transfers you do, unless of course the connection drops out. – HansA – 2015-07-23T02:42:20.287
Not entirely what I was asking. I am already transfering one at a time, and configured filezilla to transfer over a single connection but this means that I can only transfer one file at a time. Takes a very, very long time to deploy my code and assets to my server with this method. Multiplexing would allow me to concurrently transfer multiple files while still only have filezilla configured to a single connection. Transferring over multiple connections is not the same as multiplexing. – Sven – 2015-07-23T02:45:33.640
A single SSH connection can only transfer so many bytes per second. Whether they're all bytes from a single file or whether they're bytes from a set of files, only a certain number bytes will be transferred in a given period, so the total time taken for all files will be more or less the same. – HansA – 2015-07-23T08:36:32.553