Poll an SSH Channel for Incoming Data

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Demonstrates the Chilkat Ssh.ChannelPoll method, which polls a channel for incoming messages, waiting at most the given number of milliseconds. The first argument is the channel number and the second is the poll timeout; pass 0 for a nonblocking poll.

The integer return value is -1 on error, -2 if nothing arrived before the timeout, 0 if EOF or channel close was processed, or — when greater than 0 — the total bytes currently buffered for the channel (not the bytes newly received by this call).

require 'chilkat'

success = false

#  Demonstrates the Ssh.ChannelPoll method, which polls a channel for incoming messages, waiting
#  at most the given number of milliseconds.  The 1st argument is the channel number and the 2nd
#  is the poll timeout.  Pass 0 for a nonblocking poll.

ssh = Chilkat::CkSsh.new()

sshPort = 22
success = ssh.Connect("ssh.example.com",sshPort)
if (success == false)
    print ssh.lastErrorText() + "\n";
    exit
end

#  Normally you would not hard-code the password in source.  You should instead obtain it
#  from an interactive prompt, environment variable, or a secrets vault.
password = "mySshPassword"

success = ssh.AuthenticatePw("mySshLogin",password)
if (success == false)
    print ssh.lastErrorText() + "\n";
    exit
end

channelNum = ssh.OpenSessionChannel()
if (channelNum < 0)
    print ssh.lastErrorText() + "\n";
    exit
end

#  Start a shell WITHOUT requesting a PTY.  Without a PTY the shell sees it is connected to a
#  raw data pipe and enters non-interactive mode: it suppresses the command prompt, does not
#  echo typed commands back, and skips interactive login scripts.  The output is therefore
#  clean and easily parseable -- but because no prompt is ever sent, code must not wait for
#  one.  Instead, have each command print a predictable marker, or wait for EOF / channel close.
success = ssh.SendReqShell(channelNum)
if (success == false)
    print ssh.lastErrorText() + "\n";
    exit
end

success = ssh.ChannelSendString(channelNum,"date\n","utf-8")
if (success == false)
    print ssh.lastErrorText() + "\n";
    exit
end

#  Wait up to 3 seconds for channel data.
pollTimeoutMs = 3000
#  The return value is: -1 on error, -2 if nothing arrived before the timeout, 0 if EOF or
#  channel close was processed, or the total number of buffered bytes when greater than 0.
result = ssh.ChannelPoll(channelNum,pollTimeoutMs)
if (result == -1)
    print ssh.lastErrorText() + "\n";
    exit
end

if (result == -2)
    print "No channel data arrived before the timeout." + "\n";
end

if (result == 0)
    print "EOF or channel close was processed.  Buffered data may still remain." + "\n";
end

if (result > 0)
    print "Total bytes buffered: " + result.to_s() + "\n";
end

output = ssh.getReceivedText(channelNum,"utf-8")
if (ssh.get_LastMethodSuccess() == false)
    print ssh.lastErrorText() + "\n";
    exit
end

print output + "\n";

ssh.Disconnect()