Clients Feature Comparison
The two available client types, default native clients based on ssh2-python (libssh2) and clients under pssh.clients.ssh based on ssh-python (libssh) support different authentication mechanisms and features.
Below is a comparison of feature support for the two client types.
Feature |
ssh2-python (libssh2) |
ssh-python (libssh) |
|---|---|---|
Agent forwarding |
No |
Not yet implemented |
Proxying/tunneling |
Yes |
No |
Kerberos (GSS) authentication |
Not supported |
Yes |
Private key file authentication |
Yes |
Yes |
Agent authentication |
Yes |
Yes |
Password authentication |
Yes |
Yes |
OpenSSH config parsing |
Not yet implemented |
Not yet implemented |
ECDSA keys support |
Yes |
Yes |
ED25519 keys support |
Yes |
Yes |
Certificate authentication |
Not supported |
Yes |
SFTP copy to/from hosts |
Yes |
No |
SCP functionality |
Yes |
No |
Keep-alive functionality |
Yes |
No |
The default client offers the most features, but lacks certain authentication mechanisms like GSS-API and certificate authentication. Both client types are based on C libraries and offer similar levels of performance.
Users that need the authentication mechanisms not supported by the default client can from pssh.clients.ssh import ParallelSSHClient, SSHClient instead of the default clients.