metachannel

English

Etymology

meta- +‎ channel

Noun

metachannel (plural metachannels)

1. (computing) A transmission channel used for event notifications rather than actual data.
   • 2010, Oswald Campesato, Kevin Nilson, Web 2.0 Fundamentals, page 572:

     Bayeux contains three types of channels: metachannels, service, and normal channels. Metachannels are created by the Bayeux server. Metachannels give information about events, such as handshake errors, connection, disconnection, and reconnection.

   • 2015, Jon C. Snader, VPNs Illustrated: Tunnels, VPNs, and IPsec, pages 8–25:

     The cipher_ID and digest_ID are the OpenSSL cipher and digest types—Blowfish and SHA1 by default—that this node will use for the data channel and also to encrypt the metachannel.