Specify an SSH key for git push for a given domain

Solution 1:

Even if the user and host are the same, they can still be distinguished in ~/.ssh/config. For example, if your configuration looks like this:

Host gitolite-as-alice
  HostName git.company.com
  User git
  IdentityFile /home/whoever/.ssh/id_rsa.alice
  IdentitiesOnly yes

Host gitolite-as-bob
  HostName git.company.com
  User git
  IdentityFile /home/whoever/.ssh/id_dsa.bob
  IdentitiesOnly yes

Then you just use gitolite-as-alice and gitolite-as-bob instead of the hostname in your URL:

git remote add alice git@gitolite-as-alice:whatever.git
git remote add bob git@gitolite-as-bob:whatever.git

Note

You want to include the option IdentitiesOnly yes to prevent the use of default ids. Otherwise, if you also have id files matching the default names, they will get tried first because unlike other config options (which abide by "first in wins") the IdentityFile option appends to the list of identities to try. See: https://serverfault.com/questions/450796/how-could-i-stop-ssh-offering-a-wrong-key/450807#450807

Solution 2:

You can utilize git environment variable GIT_SSH_COMMAND. Run this in your terminal under your git repository:

GIT_SSH_COMMAND='ssh -i ~/.ssh/your_private_key' git submodule update --init

Replace ~/.ssh/your_private_key with the path of ssh private key you wanna use. And you can change the subsequent git command (in the example is git submodule update --init) to others like git pull, git fetch, etc.

Solution 3:

An alternative approach to the one offered above by Mark Longair is to use an alias that will run any git command, on any remote, with an alternative SSH key. The idea is basically to switch your SSH identity when running the git commands.

Advantages relative to the host alias approach in the other answer:

• Will work with any git commands or aliases, even if you can't specify the remote explicitly.
• Easier to work with many repositories because you only need to set it up once per client machine, not once per repository on each client machine.

I use a few small scripts and a git alias admin. That way I can do, for example:

git admin push 

To push to the default remote using the alternative ("admin") SSH key. Again, you could use any command (not just push) with this alias. You could even do git admin clone ... to clone a repository that you would only have access to using your "admin" key.

Step 1: Create the alternative SSH keys, optionally set a passphrase in case you're doing this on someone else's machine.

Step 2: Create a script called “ssh-as.sh” that runs stuff that uses SSH, but uses a given SSH key rather than the default:

#!/bin/bash
exec ssh ${SSH_KEYFILE+-i "$SSH_KEYFILE"} "$@"

Step 3: Create a script called “git-as.sh” that runs git commands using the given SSH key.

#!/bin/bash
SSH_KEYFILE=$1 GIT_SSH=${BASH_SOURCE%/*}/ssh-as.sh exec git "${@:2}"

Step 4: Add an alias (using something appropriate for “PATH_TO_SCRIPTS_DIR” below):

# Run git commands as the SSH identity provided by the keyfile ~/.ssh/admin
git config --global alias.admin \!"PATH_TO_SCRIPTS_DIR/git-as.sh ~/.ssh/admin"

More details at: http://noamlewis.wordpress.com/2013/01/24/git-admin-an-alias-for-running-git-commands-as-a-privileged-ssh-identity/