SSH, which is an abbreviation for Secure Shell, is a network protocol employed to transfer protected information between a client and a hosting server, which makes it impossible for unauthorized parties to intercept any info. Many tech-savvy clients choose SSH because of the better security level. The connection is made and the commands are delivered using a command line. The offered options depend on the type of Internet hosting service - on a shared server, in particular, files can be relocated or deleted, databases can be imported and exported, and archives may be set up or unpacked. On a virtual or a dedicated server, the choices are much more - the web server and the database server may be started/stopped/rebooted, server-side software could be installed and much more. These things are not possible on a shared server, because full root access is required and all the other customers on that server would be affected. Though SSH is used mainly with UNIX-like Operating Systems, there are SSH clients for other OSs too - Windows, Mac OS, and so on.