# gitcredentials

## NAME



           gitcredentials - Providing usernames and passwords to Git
    


## SYNOPSIS



           git config credential.https://example.com.username myusername
           git config credential.helper "$helper $options"
    


## DESCRIPTION



           Git will sometimes need credentials from the user in order to
           perform operations; for example, it may need to ask for a username
           and password in order to access a remote repository over HTTP.
           Some remotes accept a personal access token or OAuth access token
           as a password. This manual describes the mechanisms Git uses to
           request these credentials, as well as some features to avoid
           inputting these credentials repeatedly.
    


## REQUESTING CREDENTIALS



           Without any credential helpers defined, Git will try the following
           strategies to ask the user for usernames and passwords:
    
            1. If the **GIT_ASKPASS** environment variable is set, the program
               specified by the variable is invoked. A suitable prompt is
               provided to the program on the command line, and the user’s
               input is read from its standard output.
    
            2. Otherwise, if the **core.askPass** configuration variable is set,
               its value is used as above.
    
            3. Otherwise, if the **SSH_ASKPASS** environment variable is set, its
               value is used as above.
    
            4. Otherwise, the user is prompted on the terminal.
    


## AVOIDING REPETITION



           It can be cumbersome to input the same credentials over and over.
           Git provides two methods to reduce this annoyance:
    
            1. Static configuration of usernames for a given authentication
               context.
    
            2. Credential helpers to cache or store passwords, or to interact
               with a system password wallet or keychain.
    
           The first is simple and appropriate if you do not have secure
           storage available for a password. It is generally configured by
           adding this to your config:
    
               [credential "https://example.com"]
                       username = me
    
           Credential helpers, on the other hand, are external programs from
           which Git can request both usernames and passwords; they typically
           interface with secure storage provided by the OS or other
           programs. Alternatively, a credential-generating helper might
           generate credentials for certain servers via some API.
    
           To use a helper, you must first select one to use (see below for a
           list).
    
           You may also have third-party helpers installed; search for
           **credential-*** in the output of **git help -a** , and consult the
           documentation of individual helpers. Once you have selected a
           helper, you can tell Git to use it by putting its name into the
           credential.helper variable.
    
            1. Find a helper.
    
                   $ git help -a | grep credential-
                   credential-foo
    
            2. Read its description.
    
                   $ git help credential-foo
    
            3. Tell Git to use it.
    
                   $ git config --global credential.helper foo
    
       **Available helpers**
           Git currently includes the following helpers:
    
           cache
               Cache credentials in memory for a short period of time. See
               git-credential-cache(1) for details.
    
           store
               Store credentials indefinitely on disk. See
               git-credential-store(1) for details.
    
           Popular helpers with secure persistent storage include:
    
           •   git-credential-libsecret (Linux)
    
           •   git-credential-osxkeychain (macOS)
    
           •   git-credential-wincred (Windows)
    
           •   **Git Credential Manager******[1] (cross platform, included in Git for
               Windows)
    
           The community maintains a comprehensive list of Git credential
           helpers at**https://git-scm.com/doc/credential-helpers ******.**OAuth**
           An alternative to inputting passwords or personal access tokens is
           to use an OAuth credential helper. Initial authentication opens a
           browser window to the host. Subsequent authentication happens in
           the background. Many popular Git hosts support OAuth.
    
           Popular helpers with OAuth support include:
    
           •   **Git Credential Manager******[1] (cross platform, included in Git for
               Windows)
    
           •**git-credential-oauth******[2] (cross platform, included in many
               Linux distributions)


## CREDENTIAL CONTEXTS



           Git considers each credential to have a context defined by a URL.
           This context is used to look up context-specific configuration,
           and is passed to any helpers, which may use it as an index into
           secure storage.
    
           For instance, imagine we are accessing
           **https://example.com/foo.git **. When Git looks into a config file to
           see if a section matches this context, it will consider the two a
           match if the context is a more-specific subset of the pattern in
           the config file. For example, if you have this in your config
           file:
    
               [credential "https://example.com"]
                       username = foo
    
           then we will match: both protocols are the same, both hosts are
           the same, and the "pattern" URL does not care about the path
           component at all. However, this context would not match:
    
               [credential "https://kernel.org"]
                       username = foo
    
           because the hostnames differ. Nor would it match **foo.example.com** ;
           Git compares hostnames exactly, without considering whether two
           hosts are part of the same domain. Likewise, a config entry for
           **http://example.com** would not match: Git compares the protocols
           exactly. However, you may use wildcards in the domain name and
           other pattern matching techniques as with the **http.**_< URL>_**.***
           options.
    
           If the "pattern" URL does include a path component, then this too
           must match exactly: the context **https://example.com/bar/baz.git **
           will match a config entry for **https://example.com/bar/baz.git**(in
           addition to matching the config entry for **https://example.com **) but
           will not match a config entry for **https://example.com/bar **.
    


## CONFIGURATION OPTIONS



           Options for a credential context can be configured either in
           **credential.***(which applies to all credentials), or
           **credential.**_< URL>_**.*** , where <URL> matches the context as described
           above.
    
           The following options are available in either location:
    
           helper
               The name of an external credential helper, and any associated
               options. If the helper name is not an absolute path, then the
               string **git credential-** is prepended. The resulting string is
               executed by the shell (so, for example, setting this to **foo**
               **--option=bar** will execute **git credential-foo --option=bar** via
               the shell. See the manual of specific helpers for examples of
               their use.
    
               If there are multiple instances of the **credential.helper**
               configuration variable, each helper will be tried in turn, and
               may provide a username, password, or nothing. Once Git has
               acquired both a username and a non-expired password, no more
               helpers will be tried.
    
               If **credential.helper** is configured to the empty string, this
               resets the helper list to empty (so you may override a helper
               set by a lower-priority config file by configuring the
               empty-string helper, followed by whatever set of helpers you
               would like).
    
           username
               A default username, if one is not provided in the URL.
    
           useHttpPath
               By default, Git does not consider the "path" component of an
               http URL to be worth matching via external helpers. This means
               that a credential stored for **https://example.com/foo.git** will
               also be used for **https://example.com/bar.git **. If you do want
               to distinguish these cases, set this option to **true**.
    


## CUSTOM HELPERS



           You can write your own custom helpers to interface with any system
           in which you keep credentials.
    
           Credential helpers are programs executed by Git to fetch or save
           credentials from and to long-term storage (where "long-term" is
           simply longer than a single Git process; e.g., credentials may be
           stored in-memory for a few minutes, or indefinitely on disk).
    
           Each helper is specified by a single string in the configuration
           variable **credential.helper**(and others, see git-config(1)). The
           string is transformed by Git into a command to be executed using
           these rules:
    
            1. If the helper string begins with "!", it is considered a shell
               snippet, and everything after the "!" becomes the command.
    
            2. Otherwise, if the helper string begins with an absolute path,
               the verbatim helper string becomes the command.
    
            3. Otherwise, the string "git credential-" is prepended to the
               helper string, and the result becomes the command.
    
           The resulting command then has an "operation" argument appended to
           it (see below for details), and the result is executed by the
           shell.
    
           Here are some example specifications:
    
               # run "git credential-foo"
               [credential]
                       helper = foo
    
               # same as above, but pass an argument to the helper
               [credential]
                       helper = "foo --bar=baz"
    
               # the arguments are parsed by the shell, so use shell
               # quoting if necessary
               [credential]
                       helper = "foo --bar='whitespace arg'"
    
               # store helper (discouraged) with custom location for the db file;
               # use `--file ~/.git-secret.txt`, rather than `--file=~/.git-secret.txt`,
               # to allow the shell to expand tilde to the home directory.
               [credential]
                       helper = "store --file ~/.git-secret.txt"
    
               # you can also use an absolute path, which will not use the git wrapper
               [credential]
                       helper = "/path/to/my/helper --with-arguments"
    
               # or you can specify your own shell snippet
               [credential "https://example.com"]
                       username = your_user
                       helper = "!f() { test \"$1\" = get && echo \"password=$(cat $HOME/.secret)\"; }; f"
    
           Generally speaking, rule (3) above is the simplest for users to
           specify. Authors of credential helpers should make an effort to
           assist their users by naming their program "git-credential-$NAME",
           and putting it in the **$PATH** or **$GIT_EXEC_PATH** during installation,
           which will allow a user to enable it with **git config**
           **credential.helper $NAME**.
    
           When a helper is executed, it will have one "operation" argument
           appended to its command line, which is one of:
    
           **get**
               Return a matching credential, if any exists.
    
           **store**
               Store the credential, if applicable to the helper.
    
           **erase**
               Remove matching credentials, if any, from the helper’s
               storage.
    
           The details of the credential will be provided on the helper’s
           stdin stream. The exact format is the same as the input/output
           format of the **git credential** plumbing command (see the section
           **INPUT/OUTPUT FORMAT** in git-credential(1) for a detailed
           specification).
    
           For a **get** operation, the helper should produce a list of
           attributes on stdout in the same format (see git-credential(1) for
           common attributes). A helper is free to produce a subset, or even
           no values at all if it has nothing useful to provide. Any provided
           attributes will overwrite those already known about by Git’s
           credential subsystem. Unrecognised attributes are silently
           discarded.
    
           While it is possible to override all attributes, well behaving
           helpers should refrain from doing so for any attribute other than
           username and password.
    
           If a helper outputs a **quit** attribute with a value of **true** or **1** , no
           further helpers will be consulted, nor will the user be prompted
           (if no credential has been provided, the operation will then
           fail).
    
           Similarly, no more helpers will be consulted once both username
           and password had been provided.
    
           For a **store** or **erase** operation, the helper’s output is ignored.
    
           If a helper fails to perform the requested operation or needs to
           notify the user of a potential issue, it may write to stderr.
    
           If it does not support the requested operation (e.g., a read-only
           store or generator), it should silently ignore the request.
    
           If a helper receives any other operation, it should silently
           ignore the request. This leaves room for future operations to be
           added (older helpers will just ignore the new requests).
    


## GIT



           Part of the git(1) suite
    


## NOTES



            1. Git Credential Manager
               https://github.com/git-ecosystem/git-credential-manager
    
            2. git-credential-oauth
               https://github.com/hickford/git-credential-oauth
    


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