Windows Generate Ssh Key Git Bash

15.12.2020
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If you’re running Windows 10, the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL), and its latest WSL 2 version, support the installation of different Linux distributions, which include the Git and SSH clients. For current versions of Windows, you can also install the Git and SSH clients with Git for Windows. Sep 26, 2019 On Windows, you can create SSH keys in many ways. This document explains how to use two SSH applications, PuTTY and Git Bash. Joyent recommends RSA keys because the node-manta CLI programs work with RSA keys both locally and with the ssh agent. Create SSH keys for Github. Depending on the operating system you are using, there are two ways of generating SSH keys for GitHub. Create SSH keys on Linux using ssh-keygen. First of all, let’s have a look at creating SSH keys on Linux operating systems. To create SSH keys on Linux, use the ssh-keygen command with a RSA algorithm (using the “-t” option). Jul 25, 2019 Go to this address, and download Git for Windows, after the download install it with default settings; Open Git Bash that you just installed (Start-All Programs-Git-Git Bash) Type in the following: ssh-keygen -t rsa (when prompted, enter password, key name can stay the same). Generating Your SSH Public Key Many Git servers authenticate using SSH public keys. In order to provide a public key, each user in your system must generate one if they don’t already have one.

SSH keys are an access credential used in SSH protocol (Secure Shell) which is a network protocol that helps to login from one computer to another securely, as well as to manage networks, operating systems, and configurations. This snippet is going to help you add an SSH key to the ssh-agent, generate a new SSH key, learn how to find the SSH key of your PC and how to connect it with your GitHub/bitbucket account. You can also find information on the use of SSH keys.

Now let's find out how we can checkout PC's SSH keys.

Checking PC's SSH Keys

Type ls -al ~/.ssh so as to see your ssh keys:

By default, the filenames of the public keys are one of the following:

Generate a new SSH key

Type this below, using your GitHub's account email:

The following text will show up after which you can hit the “Enter” button:

In this section, you can hit “Enter” again or type the secure passphrase (more about passphrase).

Adding an SSH key to the ssh-agent

Now let’s find out how we can add the SSH key to ssh-agent. Before adding, check your ssh keys or generate a new key.

Generate Ssh Key Git Bash Windows

  • Be sure ssh-agent is enabled:
  • Add your SSH key to the ssh-agent. If you used an existing SSH key rather than generating a new SSH key, you would need to replace id_rsa in the command with the name of your existing private key file:

How To Add SSH Key To Github Account

Generate
  • Log into your Github's account. In the top right corner of any page, click your profile photo, then click Settings.
  • In the user settings sidebar, go to SSH and GPG keys.
  • Click New SSH key.
  • Type Title and your SSH Key.

You can get your ssh key by typing below.

Now you have added your PC's SSH key to your Github's account.

Back up old SSH keys

If there are existing SSH keys, but you do not want to use them for connecting to Bitbucket Server, you should back up these old keys running the following:

Why we need SSH key (for Linux and OSX)

If you use Git and want to clone anything from remote repositories, you have to choose one of these two ways: HTTPS or SSH. If you use HTTPS, you have to type your account access every time you communicate with the remote repository, or change your configs and fill your account data (access). Another modern way is to use the SSH authentication method. It is used in many Version Control Systems to have command line access into your servers, etc. SSH key pairs can be used for authentication instead of passwords. Each key pair consists of a private key and a corresponding public key. When you use SSH key for Git, you inform Git that this PC is authenticated for that Github account, and it will never ask you about any access again because you have already given it your SSH key.


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Hi there! This post will be pretty straightforward and will cover Windows, Mac, and Linux, so if you don’t know how to do it already, read on.

Windows

Just follow these 5 steps:

Windows generate ssh key git bash download
  1. Go to this address, and download Git for Windows, after the download install it with default settings
  2. Open Git Bash that you just installed (Start->All Programs->Git->Git Bash)
  3. Type in the following: ssh-keygen -t rsa (when prompted, enter password, key name can stay the same)
  4. Open file your_home_directory/.ssh/id_rsa.pub with your favorite text editor, and copy contents to your Git repository’s keys field (GitHub, beanstalk, or any other repository provider), under your account.
  5. Be sure that you don’t copy any whitespace while copying public key’s content (id_rsa.pub)

Note: your_home_directory is either C:Usersyour_username (on Windows Vista / 7 / 8 / 10), or C:Documents and Settingsyour_username (on Windows XP)

Mac

Follow these 5 steps:

Create Ssh Key Windows 10

  1. Start the terminal
  2. Navigate to your home directory by typing: cd ~/
  3. Execute the following command: ssh-keygen -t rsa (when prompted, enter password, key name can stay the same)
  4. Open the file you’ve just created ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub with your favorite text editor, and copy contents to your Git repository’s keys field (GitHub, beanstalk, or any other repository provider), under your account.
  5. Be sure that you don’t copy any whitespace while copying public key’s content (id_rsa.pub)

Linux (Ubuntu)

Follow these 5 steps:

Github Create Ssh Key Windows

  1. Open console
  2. cd ~
  3. ssh-keygen -t rsa (when prompted, enter password, key name can stay the same)
  4. open file /home/your_username/.ssh/id_rsa.pub with your favorite text editor, and copy contents to your Git repository’s keys field (GitHub, beanstalk, or any other repository provider), under your account.
  5. Be sure that you don’t copy any whitespace while copying public key’s content (id_rsa.pub)

Generate Ssh Key Windows

Additional info

When you create private/public SSH keys on your machine (that’s what you did in the above steps), it’s not enough. You need to give your public key to the repository in order to pair the Git server with your local machine (that’d be steps 4. and 5. above).

Most of the popular repositories will give you web interface access to the application, and here’s how it looks like on Github:
After this step, you’re ready to start using Git.

Generate Ssh Key Aix

Conclusion

I hope this wasn’t too complicated to follow, and also I hope it was helpful to someone!

Cheers!

____________________________________________________________________________________________ Generate a ssh key on windows.

Note! This article was revised on Jul 26, 2019. The original article was posted in 2011 by Mladen Lotar.