git: fatal: Could not read from remote repository

I am trying to set git up with http://danielmiessler.com/study/git/#website to manage my site.

I have gotten to the last step in the instructions: git push website +master:refs/heads/master

I am working using the git ming32 command line in win7

$ git push website +master:refs/heads/master
Bill@***.com's password:
Connection closed by 198.91.80.3
fatal: Could not read from remote repository.

Please make sure you have the correct access rights
and the repository exists.

One problem here may be that the program is looking for Bill@***.com. when I connect via ssh to my site I have a different username( lets say 'abc'). so maybe this should be abc@***.com. If so I don't know how to change this or if I can push under an alias

Solution 1:

Your ssh key most likely had been removed from ssh agent

ssh-add ~/.ssh/id_rsa

where id_rsa is a ssh key associated with git repo

Update

You may get Could not open a connection to your authentication agent. error to resolve that you need to start the agent first by:

eval `ssh-agent -s`

Solution 2:

I was facing same issue a while ago...

my .git/config had

url = [email protected]:manishnakar/polymer-demo.git

I replaced it with

url = https://github.com/manishnakar/polymer-demo.git 

and it works now:)

Solution 3:

You can specify the username that SSH should send to the remote system as part of your remote's URL. Put the username, followed by an @, before the remote hostname.

git remote set-url website abc@***.com:path/to/repo

Solution 4:

Make sure you have correct url in .git/config

url = [email protected]:username/repo.git

If it's your first push, you'll need to set up correct upstream

$ git push -u origin master

You can check which key is used by:

$ ssh -vvv [email protected]

The reply should contain something like this:

debug1: Next authentication method: publickey
debug1: Offering RSA public key: ~/.ssh/id_rsa
...
You've successfully authenticated, but GitHub does not provide shell access.

Also it's possible to define rules for ssh in ~/.ssh/config, e.g. based on aliases:

   Host github
      HostName github.com 
      User git
      IdentityFile "~/.ssh/id_rsa"

   Host git
      HostName github.com 
      User git
      IdentityFile "~/.ssh/some_other_id"

You can set connect to different ports, use different username etc. for each alias.

Solution 5:

Try removing the GIT_SSH environment variable with unset GIT_SSH. This was the cause of my problem.