Setting up SSH with Bitbucket

If you set up an SSH-key you won’t have to enter your username and password every time you do something on BitBucket or GitHub.

First you need to generate an SSH-key on your computer. To check if you have one, write this in the Terminal:

Check if you have an SSH-key

$ ls -a ~/.ssh

If it only shows ‘known_hosts’ you don’t have a key. If you have some id or rsa stuff, you have one.

To create a key, enter this:

$ ssh-keygen

… and follow the instructions to enter a passphrase of your choice.

To use it, you need to copy the contents of the key (it’s a text file) into Bitbucket.

On Linux, enter this and copy what the Terminal returns:

$ cat ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub

On OS X, enter this (which will automatically copy it):

$ pbcopy < ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub

Go to bitbucket.com and find your account page where you’ll find the ‘SSH keys’ page.

Add a new and copy in the key which you got in the previous step. The first time you use it it’ll ask for your passphrase.

Done!