Multiple SSH keys for different github accounts

multiple_ssh_setting.md

Multiple SSH Keys settings for different github account

create different public key

create different ssh key according the article Mac Set-Up Git

$ ssh-keygen -t rsa -C "your_email@youremail.com"

Please refer to github ssh issues for common problems.

for example, 2 keys created at:

~/.ssh/id_rsa_activehacker
~/.ssh/id_rsa_jexchan

then, add these two keys as following

$ ssh-add ~/.ssh/id_rsa_activehacker
$ ssh-add ~/.ssh/id_rsa_jexchan

you can delete all cached keys before

$ ssh-add -D

finally, you can check your saved keys

$ ssh-add -l

Modify the ssh config

$ cd ~/.ssh/
$ touch config
$ subl -a config

Then added

#activehacker account
Host github.com-activehacker
	HostName github.com
	User git
	IdentityFile ~/.ssh/id_rsa_activehacker

#jexchan account
Host github.com-jexchan
	HostName github.com
	User git
	IdentityFile ~/.ssh/id_rsa_jexchan

Clone you repo and modify your Git config

clone your repo git clone git@github.com:activehacker/gfs.git gfs_jexchan

cd gfs_jexchan and modify git config

$ git config user.name "jexchan"
$ git config user.email "jexchan@gmail.com" 

$ git config user.name "activehacker"
$ git config user.email "jexlab@gmail.com" 

or you can have global git config $ git config --global user.name "jexchan" $ git config --global user.email "jexchan@gmail.com"

then use normal flow to push your code

$ git add .
$ git commit -m "your comments"
$ git push

Another related article in Chinese

1. http://4simple.github.com/docs/multipleSSHkeys/

munging your .git/config remote is just going to end up being a hassle in the long run.

trust me, been there done that, never doing it again tomorrow.

the. most. portable. way is to setup your root gitconfig so that it uses the includeif.

edit: like mentioned here:
https://gist.github.com/jexchan/2351996?permalink_comment_id=4456452#gistcomment-4456452

The includeif stanza/directive modifies your git config on the fly based on the CWD of the git operation. Relevant to this thread, this is where we can teach git about the ssh_command, which is where you point to your shiny unique ssh key.

The end result is a set of dotfiles ~/.gitconfig, ~/.dotfiles/this.gitconfig, ~/.dotfiles/that.gitconfig you can carry around and a directory structure for your ~/Projects

~/.gitconfig

[core]
	editor = DISPLAY=:1 code --wait

[init]
	defaultBranch = master

[rerere]
	enabled = true

[includeIf "gitdir:Projects/Mine/Gitlab/"]
        path = ~/.dotfiles/mine-gitlab.gitconfig

[includeIf "gitdir:Projects/Mine/Github/"]
        path = ~/.dotfiles/mine-github.gitconfig

[includeIf "gitdir:Projects/Experiements/Github/"]
        path = ~/.dotfiles/mine-github.gitconfig

[includeIf "gitdir:Projects/Work/Github/SomeCompany"]
        path = ~/.dotfiles/work-somecompany.gitconfig

Personal Configs

~/.dotfiles/mine-gitlab.gitconfig

[user]
name = My Name
email = other.e@ma.il

~/.dotfiles/mine-github.gitconfig

[user]
name = My Name
email = mygithubusername@users.noreply.github'com
signingkey = DEADBEEF

[commit]
gpgsign = true

[gpg]
program = age

For the above, any git operations occurring within a path that matches either:

• Projects/Mine/Gitlab/
• Projects/Mine/GitHub/, or
• Projects/Experiements/Github/

will use my github config.

Work Configs

~/.dotfiles/work-github-somecompany.gitconfig

[core]
sshCommand = "ssh -o IdentitiesOnly -i ~/.ssh/id_rsa-mymachinename-github-somecompany -F /dev/null"

For the above, any git operation occuring in a directory that matches Projects/Work/Github/SomeCompany will specifically use a different ssh key despite my ~/.ssh/config declaring another for other general github ssh connections. The -o IdentitiesOnly tells ssh to use only the private key specified with the "-i" option and ignore any other keys in the SSH agent or on the remote server.

The main reasons I love this setup :

can just copy paste a github git repo url with wild abandon and paste it without having to remember the magical things to modify.

don't have to do anything in the ~/.ssh/config since what we really wanted this for was git and nothing else.

thank you, this work best for my need