How to prevent that the password to decrypt the private key has to be entered every time when using Git Bash on Windows?

Question

I\'ve an automatic building service which download from a git private repository. The problem is that when it tries to clone repository it need to provide the password, beca

Answer 1

I prefer not to have to type my SSH passphrase when opening new terminals; unfortunately starmonkey's solution requires the password to be typed in for every session. Instead, I have this in my .bash_profile file:

# Note: ~/.ssh/environment should not be used, as it
#       already has a different purpose in SSH.

env=~/.ssh/agent.env

# Note: Don't bother checking SSH_AGENT_PID. It's not used
#       by SSH itself, and it might even be incorrect
#       (for example, when using agent-forwarding over SSH).

agent_is_running() {
    if [ "$SSH_AUTH_SOCK" ]; then
        # ssh-add returns:
        #   0 = agent running, has keys
        #   1 = agent running, no keys
        #   2 = agent not running
        ssh-add -l >/dev/null 2>&1 || [ $? -eq 1 ]
    else
        false
    fi
}

agent_has_keys() {
    ssh-add -l >/dev/null 2>&1
}

agent_load_env() {
    . "$env" >/dev/null
}

agent_start() {
    (umask 077; ssh-agent >"$env")
    . "$env" >/dev/null
}

if ! agent_is_running; then
    agent_load_env
fi

# If your keys are not stored in ~/.ssh/id_rsa or ~/.ssh/id_dsa, you'll need
# to paste the proper path after ssh-add
if ! agent_is_running; then
    agent_start
    ssh-add
elif ! agent_has_keys; then
    ssh-add
fi

unset env

This will remember my passphrase for new terminal sessions as well; I only have to type it in once when I open my first terminal after booting.

I'd like to credit where I got this; it's a modification of somebody else's work, but I can't remember where it came from. Thanks anonymous author!

Update 2019-07-01: I don't think all this is necessary. I now consistently have this working by ensuring my .bash_profile file runs the ssh-agent:

eval $(ssh-agent)

Then I set up an ssh configuration file like this:

touch ~/.ssh/config
chmod 600 ~/.ssh/config
echo 'AddKeysToAgent yes' >> ~/.ssh/config