Configuration

Git Configuration

Connecting to GitHub with SSH

You can connect to GitHub using the Secure Shell Protocol (SSH), which provides a secure channel over an unsecured network.

  1. Checking for existing SSH keys

    $ ls -al ~/.ssh
    # Lists the files in your .ssh directory, if they exist
    
  2. Generating a new SSH key

    $ ssh-keygen -t ed25519 -C "your_email@example.com"
    

    When you’re prompted to “Enter a file in which to save the key,” press Enter. This accepts the default file location.

Note: If you are using a legacy system that doesn’t support the Ed25519 algorithm, use:

$ ssh-keygen -t rsa -b 4096 -C "your_email@example.com"
```
> Enter a file in which to save the key (/c/Users/you/.ssh/id_algorithm):[Press enter]
At the prompt, type a secure passphrase. For more information, see "Working with SSH key passphrases."
> Enter passphrase (empty for no passphrase): [Type a passphrase]
> Enter same passphrase again: [Type passphrase again]
```
  1. Adding SSH key to the ssh-agent

    Ensure the ssh-agent is running. Start it manually:

    # start the ssh-agent in the background
    $ eval "$(ssh-agent -s)"
    > Agent pid 59566
    

    Add your SSH private key to the ssh-agent. If you created your key with a different name, or if you are adding an existing key that has a different name, replace id_ed25519 in the command with the name of your private key file.

    $ ssh-add ~/.ssh/id_ed25519
    
  2. Add the SSH key to your account on GitHub.

    • Copy the SSH public key to your clipboard.

      $ clip < ~/.ssh/id_ed25519.pub
      # Copies the contents of the id_ed25519.pub file to your clipboard
      
    • In the upper-right corner of any page, click your profile photo, then click Settings

    • In the Access section of the sidebar, click SSH and GPG keys.

    • Click New SSH key or Add SSH key.

    • In the Title field, add a descriptive label for the new key. For example, if you’re using a personal laptop, call this key “Personal Laptop”.πŸ’‘

    • Paste your key into the Key field.

    • Click Add SSH key.

  • While cloning/pulling/pushing code from remote use your username and generated token when prompted for username and password respectively.
  • On Windows this stores your credentials in the Windows credential store which has a Control Panel interface where you can delete or edit your stored credentials. With this store, your details are secured by your Windows login and can persist over multiple sessions.

Initialize a new local repository

$ git init
It will create the hidden .git folder which is used by git to manage the repository in your working directory

Developer Configuration

  • If you would not like to provide credentials for every “repo” operations you could cache them. The Git credential cache runs a daemon process which caches your credentials in memory and hands them out on demand.

    $ git config --global credential.helper manager
    
  • Configure the author name and email address to be used with your commits:

    $ git config --global user.name "LAST_NAME.FIRST_NAME"
    $ git config --global user.email "WORK_EMAIL"
    
  • Normalize your line endings:

    $ git config --global core.autocrlf false
    
  • Colorized output:

    $ git config --global color.ui auto
    
  • Setup KDiff as the merge tool:

    $ git config --global --add merge.tool kdiff3
    $ git config --global --add mergetool.kdiff3.path "C:/Program Files/KDiff3/kdiff3.exe"
    
  • Setup proxies to work with Git:

    • Option1: Git Proxy without Cntlm: (Not secure as our credentials are being sent “over the wire”)
      $ git config --global http.proxy http://MyUserID:MyPassword@www-proxy.company.com:80
      $ git config --global https.proxy http://MyUserID:MyPassword@www-proxy.company.com:80
      
    • Option2: Git Proxy w/ Cntlm: (Safe since our passwords are encrypted. Generic enough to be used with a host of tools like NPM, Git, AWS, Eclipse, Docker etc.)
      $ git config --global http.proxy http://localhost:3128
      $ git config --global https.proxy http://localhost:3128
      
  • Display current settings

    $ git config --list
    

Further Read

More info here: http://git-scm.com/docs/git-config

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