SSH keys are a way to identify trusted computers without involving passwords. You can generate an SSH key and add the public key to your GitHub Enterprise account by following the procedures outlined in this section.

We recommend that you regularly review your SSH keys list and revoke any that haven't been used in a while.

Tip: GitHub Enterprise has a desktop client! Most of your work can be done in the desktop client rather than in the command line.

Tip: If you have GitHub for Windows installed, you can use it to clone repositories and not deal with SSH keys. It also comes with the Git Bash tool, which is the preferred way of running git commands on Windows.

Checking for existing SSH keys

Before you generate an SSH key, you can check to see if you have any existing SSH keys.

Generating a new SSH key and adding it to the ssh-agent

After you've checked for existing SSH keys, you can generate a new SSH key to use for authentication, then add it to the ssh-agent.

Adding a new SSH key to your GitHub account

To configure your GitHub account to use your new (or existing) SSH key, you'll also need to add it to your GitHub account.

Testing your SSH connection

After you've set up your SSH key and added it to your GitHub account, you can test your connection.