.TH SSH-ADD 1 "June 12 2007 " ""
.SH NAME
\fBssh-add\fP
\- adds RSA or DSA identities to the authentication agent
.SH SYNOPSIS
.br
\fBssh-add\fP
[\fB\-cDdLlXx\fP]
[\fB\-t\fP \fIlife\fP]
[\fIfile ...\fP]
.br
\fBssh-add\fP
\fB\-s\fP \fIreader\fP
.br
\fBssh-add\fP
\fB\-e\fP \fIreader\fP
.SH DESCRIPTION
\fBssh-add\fP
adds RSA or DSA identities to the authentication agent,
\fBssh-agent\fP(1).
When run without arguments, it adds the files
\fI~/.ssh/id_rsa\fP,
\fI~/.ssh/id_dsa\fP
and
\fI~/.ssh/identity\fP.
Alternative file names can be given on the command line.
If any file requires a passphrase,
\fBssh-add\fP
asks for the passphrase from the user.
The passphrase is read from the user's tty.
\fBssh-add\fP
retries the last passphrase if multiple identity files are given.

The authentication agent must be running and the
.IR SSH_AUTH_SOCK
environment variable must contain the name of its socket for
\fBssh-add\fP
to work.

The options are as follows:
.TP
\fB\-c\fP
Indicates that added identities should be subject to confirmation before
being used for authentication.
Confirmation is performed by the
.IR SSH_ASKPASS
program mentioned below.
Successful confirmation is signaled by a zero exit status from the
.IR SSH_ASKPASS
program, rather than text entered into the requester.
.TP
\fB\-D\fP
Deletes all identities from the agent.
.TP
\fB\-d\fP
Instead of adding identities, removes identities from the agent.
If
\fBssh-add\fP
has been run without arguments, the keys for the default identities will
be removed.
Otherwise, the argument list will be interpreted as a list of paths to
public key files and matching keys will be removed from the agent.
If no public key is found at a given path,
\fBssh-add\fP
will append
\fI\&.pub\fP
and retry.
.TP
\fB\-e\fP \fIreader\fP
Remove key in smartcard
\fIreader\fP.
.TP
\fB\-L\fP
Lists public key parameters of all identities currently represented
by the agent.
.TP
\fB\-l\fP
Lists fingerprints of all identities currently represented by the agent.
.TP
\fB\-s\fP \fIreader\fP
Add key in smartcard
\fIreader\fP.
.TP
\fB\-t\fP \fIlife\fP
Set a maximum lifetime when adding identities to an agent.
The lifetime may be specified in seconds or in a time format
specified in
\fBsshd_config\fP(5).
.TP
\fB\-X\fP
Unlock the agent.
.TP
\fB\-x\fP
Lock the agent with a password.
.SH ENVIRONMENT
.TP
.B "DISPLAY" and "SSH_ASKPASS"
If
\fBssh-add\fP
needs a passphrase, it will read the passphrase from the current
terminal if it was run from a terminal.
If
\fBssh-add\fP
does not have a terminal associated with it but
.IR DISPLAY
and
.IR SSH_ASKPASS
are set, it will execute the program specified by
.IR SSH_ASKPASS
and open an X11 window to read the passphrase.
This is particularly useful when calling
\fBssh-add\fP
from a
\fI\&.xsession\fP
or related script.
(Note that on some machines it
may be necessary to redirect the input from
\fI/dev/null\fP
to make this work.)
.TP
.B SSH_AUTH_SOCK
Identifies the path of a unix-domain socket used to communicate with the
agent.
.SH FILES
.TP
.B ~/.ssh/identity
Contains the protocol version 1 RSA authentication identity of the user.
.TP
.B ~/.ssh/id_dsa
Contains the protocol version 2 DSA authentication identity of the user.
.TP
.B ~/.ssh/id_rsa
Contains the protocol version 2 RSA authentication identity of the user.

Identity files should not be readable by anyone but the user.
Note that
\fBssh-add\fP
ignores identity files if they are accessible by others.
.SH DIAGNOSTICS
Exit status is 0 on success, 1 if the specified command fails,
and 2 if
\fBssh-add\fP
is unable to contact the authentication agent.
.SH SEE ALSO
\fBssh\fP(1),
\fBssh-agent\fP(1),
\fBssh-keygen\fP(1),
\fBsshd\fP(8)
.SH AUTHORS
OpenSSH is a derivative of the original and free
ssh 1.2.12 release by Tatu Ylonen.
Aaron Campbell, Bob Beck, Markus Friedl, Niels Provos,
Theo de Raadt and Dug Song
removed many bugs, re-added newer features and
created OpenSSH.
Markus Friedl contributed the support for SSH
protocol versions 1.5 and 2.0.