Setting up SSH keys for GitHub

Question

I'm following these instructions for how to set up SSH keys for use with GitHub.

The instructions tell you to delete your current .ssh directory and create new keys in that .ssh directory. I'm unable to do this as I already have keys in my id_dsa.pub that I need to use for other servers.

Is it possible to set up SSH for GitHub while preserving the keys I already have saved in .ssh? Or is there another way to set up SSH for GitHub?

Answer 1

Make sure you have this in the global configuration:

git config --global credential.helper osxkeychain

Answer 2

You can either reuse your key pair already in your directory, or create a new key-pair specifically for GitHub's use. If you decide not to use the default pair, you'll need to modify your ~/.ssh/config file and add a host definition for GitHub pointing it to the new key file. So, if your new key pair is github_rsa and github_rsa.pub, put these lines in /.ssh/config:

Host github.com
    HostName github.com
    User git
    IdentityFile ~/.ssh/github_rsa

Now, whenever you do pull or push operations to [e-mail], the alternate identity file will be used.

Answer 3

You can generate keys with specific names like:

ssh-keygen -t rsa -f ~/.ssh/id_rsa_github -C "[e-mail]"

And then you can specify this key for a separate server in the ~/.ssh/config file:

Host *github.com
  IdentityFile ~/.ssh/id_rsa_github
  User git

See man ssh or man ssh_config for more details.