1ssh-add(1) User Commands ssh-add(1)
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6 ssh-add - add RSA or DSA identities to the authentication agent
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9 ssh-add [-lLdDxX] [-t life] [ file ]...
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13 The ssh-add utility adds RSA or DSA identities to the authentication
14 agent, ssh-agent(1). When run without arguments, it attempts to add all
15 of the files $HOME/.ssh/identity (RSA v1), $HOME/.ssh/id_rsa (RSA v2),
16 and $HOME/.ssh/id_dsa (DSA v2) that exist. If more than one of the pri‐
17 vate keys exists, an attempt to decrypt each with the same passphrase
18 is made before reprompting for a different passphrase. The passphrase
19 is read from the user's tty or by running the program defined in
20 SSH_ASKPASS (see below).
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23 The authentication agent must be running.
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26 The following options are supported:
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28 -d Instead of adding the identity, this option removes the
29 identity from the agent.
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32 -D Deletes all identities from the agent.
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35 -l Lists fingerprints of all identities currently represented
36 by the agent.
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39 -L Lists public key parameters of all identities currently rep‐
40 resented by the agent.
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43 -t life Sets a maximum lifetime when adding identities to an agent.
44 The lifetime can be specified in seconds or in a time format
45 specified in sshd(1M).
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48 -x Locks the agent with a password.
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51 -X Unlocks the agent.
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55 DISPLAY If ssh-add needs a passphrase, it reads the passphrase
56 SSH_ASKPASS from the current terminal if it was run from a termi‐
57 nal. If ssh-add does not have a terminal associated
58 with it but DISPLAY and SSH_ASKPASS are set, it exe‐
59 cutes the program specified by SSH_ASKPASS and open an
60 X11 window to read the passphrase. This is particu‐
61 larly useful when calling ssh-add from a .Xsession or
62 related script. The system is shipped with
63 /usr/lib/ssh/ssh-askpass which is the default value
64 for SSH_ASKPASS.
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67 SSH_AUTH_SOCK Identifies the path of a unix-domain socket used to
68 communicate with the agent.
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72 The following exit values are returned:
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74 0 Successful completion.
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77 1 An error occurred.
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81 These files should not be readable by anyone but the user. Notice that
82 ssh-add ignores a file if it is accessible by others. It is possible to
83 specify a passphrase when generating the key; that passphrase is used
84 to encrypt the private part of this file.
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87 If these files are stored on a network file system it is assumed that
88 either the protection provided in the file themselves or the transport
89 layer of the network file system provides sufficient protection for the
90 site policy. If this is not the case, then it is recommended the key
91 files are stored on removable media or locally on the relevant hosts.
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94 Recommended names for the DSA and RSA key files:
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96 $HOME/.ssh/identity Contains the RSA authentication identity of
97 the user for protocol version 1.
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100 $HOME/.ssh/identity.pub Contains the public part of the RSA authen‐
101 tication identity of the user for protocol
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105 $HOME/.ssh/id_dsa Contains the private DSA authentication
106 identity of the user.
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109 $HOME/.ssh/id_dsa.pub Contains the public part of the DSA authen‐
110 tication identity of the user.
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113 $HOME/.ssh/id_rsa Contains the private RSA authentication
114 identity of the user.
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117 $HOME/.ssh/id_rsa.pub Contains the public part of the RSA authen‐
118 tication identity of the user.
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121 /usr/lib/ssh/ssh-askpass Contains the default value for SSH_ASKPASS.
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125 See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following attributes:
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130 ┌─────────────────────────────┬─────────────────────────────┐
131 │ ATTRIBUTE TYPE │ ATTRIBUTE VALUE │
132 ├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
133 │Availability │SUNWsshu │
134 ├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
135 │Interface Stability │Committed │
136 └─────────────────────────────┴─────────────────────────────┘
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139 ssh(1), ssh-agent(1), ssh-keygen(1), sshd(1M), attributes(5)
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143SunOS 5.11 20 May 2009 ssh-add(1)