ssh-add

Section: SSH (1)
Updated: November 8, 1995
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NAME

ssh-add - adds identities for the authentication agent

SYNOPSIS

ssh-add[-p][-l][-d][-D][file...]

DESCRIPTION

Ssh-addadds identities to the authentication agent,ssh-agent.When run without arguments, it adds the file$HOME/.ssh/identity.Alternative file names can be given on thecommand line. If any file requires a passphrase,ssh-addasks for the passphrase from the user. If the -p option is given thenthe passphrase is read from stdin, otherwise if the user is using X11,the passphrase is requested using a small X11 program; otherwise it isread from the user's tty. (Note: it may be necessary to redirect stdinfrom /dev/null to get the passphrase requested using X11.)

The authentication agent must be running and must be an ancestor ofthe current process forssh-addto work.

OPTIONS

-p: Read passphrase from stdin (or pipe).
-l: Lists all identities currently represented by the agent.
-d: Instead of adding the identity, removes the identity from the agent.
-D: Deletes all identities from the agent.

RETURN STATUS

Ssh-addreturns one of the following exit statuses. These may be useful in scripts.

0: The requested operation was performed successfully.
1: No connection could be made to the authentication agent. Presumablythere is no authentication agent active in the execution environmentofssh-add.
2: The user did not supply a required passphrase.
3: An identify file could not be found, was not readable, or was inbad format.
4: The agent does not have the requested identity.
5: An unspecified error has occurred; this is a catch-all for errors notlisted above.

FILES

$HOME/.ssh/identity: Contains the RSA authentication identity of the user. This fileshould not be readable by anyone but the user. It is possible tospecify a passphrase when generating the key; that passphrase will beused to encrypt the private part of this file. This is thedefault file added byssh-addwhen no other files have been specified.
: Ifssh-addneeds a passphrase, it will read the passphrase from the currentterminal if it was run from a terminal. Ifssh-adddoes not have a terminal associated with it butDISPLAYis set, itwill open an X11 window to read the passphrase. This is particularlyuseful when callingssh-addfrom a .Xsession or related script. (Note that on some machines itmay be necessary to redirect the input from /dev/null to make this work.)

AUTHOR

Tatu Ylonen <ylo@ssh.com>