Git SSH public key authentication failed with git on Azure DevOps

Question

I am trying to push a git repo from PowerShell into an Azure DevOps repo, and I keep getting different auth errors when trying to push it.

I am hoping somebody can shed some light on what I check, and do a proper walkthrough.

E.g.,

git remote add origin git@ssh.dev.azure.com:v3/MyAzure/MyProject/MyRepo
git push -u origin --all

I keep getting:

git@ssh.dev.azure.com's password:

I've input all sorts of passwords, but it's still failing. Which password is it talking about?

Alternatively, I've also gotten:

Permission denied, please try again.

fatal: Could not read from remote repository.

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

Verification:

$ ssh -T myemail@mycompany.com
ssh: connect to host mycompany.com  port 22: Connection refused

I have done the following:

Created a repo in Azure DevOps
Created a SSH key using git-bash, as per Microsoft's documentation, copied and pasted without spaces into Azure DevOps security.
Gone to my profile/security and added an SSH key (generated in git-bash)

Am I missing the obvious? Is it better to use personal access token? Can anyone provide a walk through of the correct steps?

please follow [this](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/devops/repos/git/use-ssh-keys-to-authenticate?view=vsts) step by step instruction — Jayendran, Oct 25 '18 at 10:52
did the `Git clone git@ssh.dev.azure.com:v3/fabrikam-fiber/FabrikamFiber/FabrikamFiber` works fine ? — Jayendran, Oct 26 '18 at 02:22
@Jayendran it asks me enter passphrase for key .ssh/id_rsa ,left it empy and press enter and then asks me for git@ssh.dev.azure.com's password — developer9969, Oct 26 '18 at 04:35
@Jayendran I have the same issue, I enter the passphrase I setup for my ssh key, but then I'm asked for the `git@ssh.dev.azure.com's password` — Schalton, Nov 05 '18 at 13:50
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/43868402/cloning-a-git-repo-from-vsts-over-ssh-asks-a-password-unexpected indicates that we're being prompted for the password because the SSH validation is failing — Schalton, Nov 05 '18 at 13:53
In case someone runs into this problem when trying to use Pageant on windows: the solution is to put the path of your plink.exe file in an environment variable named "GIT_SSH" — Joe, Sep 08 '19 at 13:16
look at the official doc [I have multiple SSH keys. How do I use different SSH keys for different SSH servers or repos?](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/devops/repos/git/use-ssh-keys-to-authenticate?view=azure-devops&tabs=current-page#q-i-have-multiple-ssh-keys--how-do-i-use-different-ssh-keys-for-different-ssh-servers-or-repos) — vladimir, May 06 '20 at 09:34

score 40 · Answer 1 · edited May 12 '22 at 22:15

40

This worked for me

adding a config (a file named config) file in ~/.ssh/

and adding these lines

Host ssh.dev.azure.com
  IdentityFile ~/.ssh/your_private_key
  IdentitiesOnly yes

This link by @wcoder helped

edited May 12 '22 at 22:15

Devin Rhode

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answered Mar 30 '20 at 21:41

superjisan

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Thank you! I have forgotten "ssh." in the front of the "Host" entry in my config file. Your solution works fine! – Jordan Sep 21 '20 at 13:23
What does your config file look like? Can you provide a link to what this file is supposed to be? – jbooker Nov 09 '20 at 21:36
this worked for me too, I have an id_ed25519 for github and an entry in the config file that I think was hit as wildcard (*) which obviously did not work for azure. – noppe Dec 10 '20 at 09:54

score 22 · Answer 2 · answered Nov 06 '20 at 20:02

22

Before this I had already tried the other answers, but nothing worked. At last, this article had the solution for me in Fedora.

Running ssh with the -v switch (ssh -v -T git@ssh.dev.azure.com) revealed this error:

debug1: send_pubkey_test: no mutual signature algorithm

Workaround is to add this line to the client configuration file (~/.ssh/config):

PubkeyAcceptedKeyTypes +rsa-sha2-256,rsa-sha2-512

answered Nov 06 '20 at 20:02

Eddy Castillo

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This solved the issue when SSHing to a RouterOS device. I guess they changed something in an update recently, since I didn't have this problem a few months ago. – pyansharp Dec 28 '20 at 20:00
Complementary to above solutions, worked for me – amartin1911 Jan 07 '22 at 12:09

eltbus · Answer 3 · 2020-04-19T14:40:53.053

19

I believe @Schalton's comment is right: SSH validation is failing, so it prompts for the pass.

Had the same problem. "Solved it" by generating the key as the default value ('id_rsa') instead of using other names (tried other names and none of them worked).

[####@#### .ssh]$ ssh-keygen -t rsa
Generating public/private rsa key pair.
Enter file in which to save the key (/home/guille/.ssh/id_rsa): id_rsa
Enter passphrase (empty for no passphrase):
Enter same passphrase again:
Your identification has been saved in id_rsa.
Your public key has been saved in id_rsa.pub.

EDIT: As noted by @LHM the value default (no input needed) for the file in which to save the key is showed in parenthesis.

edited Apr 19 '20 at 14:40

answered Feb 15 '19 at 22:45

eltbus

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i have a file with same name id_rsa.pub in /home/ubuntu/.ssh/ <> but am still getting this message "git@ssh.dev.azure.com's password:" in the shell. Can any one explain this – Ahmer Saeed Jul 12 '19 at 16:17
This helped a lot man! Just solve my problem generating the new key – Mauro Vinicius Nov 24 '21 at 16:22

LHM · Answer 4 · 2021-05-31T21:08:57.847

TL;DR: It turns out the path and filename shown in parenthesis (e.g./home/guille/.ssh/id_rsa) is a default value that can be accepted simply by leaving it blank and hitting Enter.

Extended Answer: I, too, had the same problem. I made the same mistake as @eltbus (attempting to name the file something myself), so his answer of sticking to the default of "id_rsa" was helpful to me. I also realized that when I generated the rsa key pair, I saved id_rsa.pub to the wrong folder. (Only entering id_rsa without a leading file path, can save it to a different folder.)

You can avoid both of my above mistakes if you simply hit Enter to accept the default file name and location, instead of typing in a path and/or file name.

Example:

[####@#### .ssh]$ ssh-keygen -t rsa
Generating public/private rsa key pair.
Enter file in which to save the key (/home/guille/.ssh/id_rsa):
Enter passphrase (empty for no passphrase):
Enter same passphrase again:
Your identification has been saved in id_rsa.
Your public key has been saved in id_rsa.pub.

leaving the file name blank did the trick for me. it will still not work even if you enter the same file name id_rsa as it will save it in the parent folder. — Saj, Feb 19 '20 at 02:08

score 10 · Answer 5 · answered Dec 27 '19 at 07:58

10

I realize this question mentions powershell. However, with the title and tags people on other OS's may end up here, and there is a common problem with Azure Devops access from mac and linux.

To fix this for mac and linux, add IdentitiesOnly yes to ~/.ssh/config

This is a common problem for Azure Devops. Unfortunately I'm not certain why this fixes it.

answered Dec 27 '19 at 07:58

Jack Davidson

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Yes, you are right! [DevOps Q&A](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/devops/repos/git/use-ssh-keys-to-authenticate?view=azure-devops&tabs=current-page#q-i-have-multiple-ssh-keys--how-do-i-use-different-ssh-keys-for-different-ssh-servers-or-repos) – wcoder Mar 15 '20 at 20:27

score 3 · Answer 6 · answered Sep 28 '19 at 03:14

3

I have the same problem.

My solution was:

The path while I try to use sudo git clone... doesn't have permission to access my public and private key location: \home\localuser\.ssh\....

To solve this, I change ownership of the destination path to the same user:group ware my keys are stored and avoid to use sudo git clone...., now im using git clone without sudo and everything works.

I hope you understand...

answered Sep 28 '19 at 03:14

Rafael Gomez

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Is this really the same problem? Reading the question, I think it is different to the one you were trying to solve. Your problem is about cloning using `sudo` (which is a bad idea). The actual question appears to be about setting up an SSH key correctly. – Stephen C Sep 28 '19 at 03:50

score 2 · Answer 7 · answered Jun 10 '20 at 15:43

I saw my repo ssh URL which was different from my DevOps URL in my case what worked was adding the config file in my ~/.ssh folder with the following information:

Host vs-ssh.visualstudio.com <-- hostname found in my repo SSH URL
    IdentityFile ~/.ssh/id_rsa_vsonline <-- your key name
    IdentitiesOnly yes

then tested it with

ssh -v vs-ssh.visualstudio.com

in the trace, I got something like

Authenticated to vs-ssh.visualstudio.com ([IP]:22).

score 1 · Answer 8 · answered Apr 10 '19 at 14:26

1

When you paste in the key on the settings page of Azure DevOps don't change anything including the space appended at the end of the public key.

answered Apr 10 '19 at 14:26

Nyasha Shawn Majoto

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score 1 · Answer 9 · edited Mar 27 '22 at 17:09

1

I was using the GitHub recommended Ed25519 algorithm key which Azure DevOps doesn't support so I generated a standard key. The problem was I forgot to add the key:

ssh-add -k ~/.ssh/id_rsa

edited Mar 27 '22 at 17:09

tijko

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answered Sep 11 '21 at 18:23

GentryRiggen

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score 0 · Answer 10 · answered Sep 06 '19 at 18:43

I followed the official permissions denied troubleshooting guide and it turned out, I had to re-generate the key after all. But I think it is best to follow the guide as it provides information on quite a few different scenarios that most of which are not mentioned here.

score 0 · Answer 11 · edited May 28 '20 at 16:01

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Sign into your Azure DevOps. Go to Repos > Files, then click Clone. Finally, under the HTTPS tab, click Generate Git Credentials.

edited May 28 '20 at 16:01

Jeremy Caney

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answered May 28 '20 at 15:22

Hesam Moosapour

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This is for cloning over HTTPS, not SSH. – kthy Feb 09 '22 at 10:19

Rikard Askelöf · Answer 12 · 2021-06-17T08:24:27.553

0

I tried every answer but with no success. It turned out it was as simple as putting the id_rsa and id_rsa.pub files in the .ssh folder under my user folder.

So by moving the files (id_rsa and id_rsa.pub) between the following locations it solved the problem and authentication succeded.

From:

C:\Users\My User\

To:

C:\Users\My User\.ssh\

edited Jun 17 '21 at 08:24

answered Jun 17 '21 at 07:44

Rikard Askelöf

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score 0 · Answer 13 · answered Jan 04 '22 at 13:30

Like Eltbus Answer, I "Solved it" by generating the key as the default value ('id_rsa') instead of using other names (tried other names and none of them worked).

Then i just followed this steps

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/devops/repos/git/use-ssh-keys-to-authenticate?view=azure-devops#questions-and-troubleshooting

score 0 · Answer 14 · answered Apr 18 '22 at 20:53

0

All who are having this issue I would verify that you dont have spaces in your project name. Spaces caused git-upload-pack to break for me using git 2.33 and 2.35.

answered Apr 18 '22 at 20:53

Monty Harris

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score 0 · Answer 15 · answered Apr 27 '22 at 14:41

In my case, I had access to two different repositories of different companies.

I had to make a new SSH Key for one project, which impacted my access to the other. The solution was:

type cd ~/.ssh -> go to the .ssh folder
type ls -> list what is inside; since I made a new key for the other project I obviously had these directories: id_rsa id_rsa.pub
type pbcopy < id_rsa.pub -> copy the key to the clipboard
Configure they key according to this documentation - Step 2: https://docs.microsoft.com/de-de/azure/devops/repos/git/use-ssh-keys-to-authenticate?view=azure-devops#configuration

For those who do not have the folders in ~/.ssh, you have to first create the SSH Key - Step 1.

Git SSH public key authentication failed with git on Azure DevOps

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