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SSH Terminal

OpsKat provides a full-featured SSH terminal with split pane, SFTP file browsing, jump host chains, port forwarding, and SOCKS proxy support.

Connecting to Assets​

Select an SSH asset from the sidebar and click Connect (or double-click). A terminal session opens in a new tab. Credentials are resolved automatically from the encrypted credential store.

Multiple sessions can be open simultaneously in separate tabs.

Split Pane​

The terminal supports splitting into multiple panes within a single tab using a binary tree structure:

  • Split horizontally — Divide the current pane top/bottom
  • Split vertically — Divide the current pane left/right

Each split creates a new terminal session. Pane proportions can be adjusted by dragging the divider. You can split any existing pane further, creating a grid of terminal sessions.

Customizable Themes​

Terminal appearance is fully customizable:

  • Choose from built-in xterm color themes
  • Create custom themes with the theme editor
  • Customize colors for foreground, background, cursor, selection, and the 16 ANSI colors

Theme settings are stored per-user and apply to all terminal sessions.

SFTP File Browser​

Each SSH connection includes an integrated SFTP file browser for visual file management:

  • Browse the remote filesystem with a tree/list view
  • Upload files from your local machine to the remote server
  • Download files from the remote server
  • Navigate directories and view file metadata

Jump Host Chains​

For servers behind bastion hosts, configure jump host chains:

  1. Create the bastion/jump host as an SSH asset.
  2. When creating or editing the target asset, select the jump host in the Jump Host field.
  3. OpsKat connects through the jump host automatically.

Jump hosts can be chained (e.g., Bastion A > Bastion B > Target Server). The maximum chain depth is 5 to prevent circular references.

Port Forwarding​

Set up SSH port forwarding (tunneling) for accessing remote services:

Local Forwarding​

Forward a local port to a remote host/port through the SSH connection. Useful for accessing remote services (databases, web apps) as if they were local.

  • Local Host / Port — The local address to listen on
  • Remote Host / Port — The destination reachable from the SSH server

Remote Forwarding​

Forward a remote port back to a local host/port. Useful for exposing local services to the remote network.

Port forwarding configurations are saved per-asset and can include multiple rules grouped into named configurations.

SOCKS Proxy​

Configure a SOCKS proxy for the SSH connection. This is useful when the SSH server is only reachable through a proxy.

Set the proxy in the asset's SSH configuration:

  • Type — socks5 or socks4
  • Host / Port — Proxy server address
  • Username / Password — Optional proxy authentication

Connection Pooling​

OpsKat maintains an SSH connection pool to improve performance:

  • Connections are reused across multiple operations (terminal, SFTP, AI Agent commands)
  • The opsctl CLI can reuse the desktop app's pooled connections when both are running, communicating via a Unix socket server
  • Connections are automatically cleaned up when idle