This comprehensive guide will help you set up and use an SSH key on your Mac.
This was written for CST's COMM 2216 course.
- Checking for an existing SSH key
- Generating a new SSH key
- Adding a new SSH key to your local device
- Adding a new SSH key to your GitHub account
- Forking and cloning a repository from GitHub
- Pushing to a repository from GitHub
Our goal with this guide was to create a comprehensive, easy-to-follow set of steps for anyone who wishes to set up an SSH key instead of going through the process of setting up GitHub tokens. We find SSH keys to be preferable over tokens because they do not expire and are more secure.
- Google icons: https://fonts.google.com/icons
- References for layout, content:
- Cloned repo found at: https://github.com/just-the-docs/just-the-docs
- Used information from the GitHub SSH Instructions
- Markdown
- Visual Studio Code
We felt that GitHub SSH was a safer, more user friendly alternative to using GitHub tokens, and thus endeavoured to create this document to confer to you our knowledge of GitHub SSH.
Though we are by no means experts in the topic, we hope that our efforts prove useful to anyone who comes across these instructions looking for insight into the inner workings and nuances of GitHub SSH.
Regardless of what knowledge you may have obtained from these pages, our writing of this has also provided us with the opportunity to practice creating clear and precise user instructions for our target audience. This assignment has also helped us learn how to work better with our peers, strengthening our teamwork and communication skills. And, as such, we would like to take this opportunity to thank you for being here to witness the fruits of our labour.
We hope that this guide is able to assist you in setting up and working with SSH. While SSH may appear complex, it is actually a much simpler system once you get to know it, and its added security measures will ultimately result in a much smoother workflow experience with both Git and GitHub.