Avoid SSH Timeout Issues

sshd (the server) closes the connection if it doesn't hear anything from the client for a while.

You can tell your client to send a sign-of-life signal to the server once in a while.

The configuration for this is in the file ~/.ssh/config.

To send the signal every four minutes to remotehost, put the following in your ~/.ssh/config.

Host remotehost
  HostName remotehost.com
  ServerAliveInterval 240

To enable it for all hosts use:

Host *
  ServerAliveInterval 240

Also make sure to run chmod 600 ~/.ssh/config, because the config file must not be world-readable.

REF: http://superuser.com/questions/98562/way-to-avoid-ssh-connection-timeout-freezing-of-terminal-tab