Specify SSH Port for Git

Question

I use a non-standard ssh port (1234) for most of the servers I connect to. So in my ssh config file I have:

Port 1234

But github.com uses port 22. When I try to connect to github it obviously tries to use port 1234. Right now I have to edit my ssh config to get things to work.

Here is a snippet from my git config:

[remote "origin"]
        url = git@github.com:asdf/asdf.git

Answer 1

Just have a look at how to set up your ~/.ssh/config file correctly (man 5 ssh_config). You can specify different settings for different hosts easily. To solve your problem you would set

Host github.com
Port 22
Host *
Port 1234

Do have a look at the ssh_config manual page, it explains everything you need to know on the first few pages.

Answer 2

Setting up a section in ~/.ssh/config is a fine solution, but it may be useful to know about another method.

The common scp-like syntax of user@host:path does not have a place for a port, but Git also supports an ssh: URL scheme that can be used to specify the port:

ssh://git@github.com:22/asdf/asdf.git

While an ssh: URL supports port specification, it does not support relative paths (e.g. there is no direct equivalent to the scp-like syntax of user@host:path where path does not start with a slash).

GitHub treats relative and absolute paths identically, so it works for them, but it may not work for all SSH-based Git repositories. For simple SSH-based hosting, you may need to insert /home/username/ or /Users/username/ when switching from relative to absolute paths. Some hosting systems may not handle absolute paths at all (though I would tend to call such lack of support a bug).

Answer 3

(Love it when I find the answer right after asking it.)

I modified my ssh config to specify the port for each host instead of being a global setting:

Host asdf.com
    Port 1234

Host github.com
    User git
    Hostname github.com
    Port 22

Answer 4

Had a similar issue trying to connect to my git server

( have a gitea server in a docker container with ssh-port configured to 2022, instead of standard 22, here as an example my-git-server.lan ).

1. create ssh key-pair (quiet, without password)

$ ssh-keygen -q -N '' -b 4096 -f ~/.ssh/mykeyfile

(this will create two files: private-key mykeyfile and public-key mykeyfile.pub)

2. display contents of the public-key and copy/paste it to your profile's SSH keys in your git-server (similar to how you would do it on Github )

$ cat ~/.ssh/mykeyfile.pub

3. add following lines to ssh-config to specify git-server's hostname, port and key-file

$ nano ~/.ssh/config
Host my-git-server.lan
  HostName my-git-server.lan
  User git
  Port 2022
  IdentityFile ~/.ssh/mykeyfile

(notice that the username is always git, regardless of your actual username on your git-server)

4. test ssh connection to your git-server using public-key, .. and receive a success message

$ ssh -T git@my-git-server.lan

(again, notice that the username is always git)

5. specify your remote address ssh://git@my-git-server.lan:2022/alex/myproject.git for your local git repository (again, notice the user git and the port 2022), .. check remote configuration

$ cd your/local/git/repository/folder
$ git remote add my-git-server ssh://git@my-git-server.lan:2022/alex/myproject.git
$ git remote -v

( here you also see that on my git-server my actual user is alex and repository is myproject )

Done! You can now work with your git-server .. fetch/commit/push etc.

Answer 5

Found this link, and although it was helpful my blog entry might help clarify it:

https://prestongarrison.com/change-port-git-is-using-for-ssh/

Basically i think its much better to just edit your .git/config file and make the changes.