git/list[1] front-page[2] threads[3] people[4] search[5] about
 

Re: How does gitosis know who the key belongs to

From
Howard Miller <howard@e-learndesign.co.uk>
Date
Sep 25, 2009, 06:15 UTC
Message-ID
<26ae428a0909242315x3cf1aafcue004a73f5c471450@mail.gmail.com>
In-Reply-To
<26ae428a0909242310r259ccf5eya7c95b8f43fc5c23@mail.gmail.com>
2009/9/25 Howard Miller <howard@e-learndesign.co.uk>:
Show 44 quoted lines
> Hi,
>
> I don't really understand the answers I have been given. Trying
> desperately not to "top post" see bellow...
>
> 2009/9/24 Matthieu Moy <Matthieu.Moy@grenoble-inp.fr>:
>> Heiko Voigt <hvoigt@hvoigt.net> writes:
>>
>>> On Thu, Sep 24, 2009 at 03:51:44PM +0100, Howard Miller wrote:
>>>> Gitosis obviously uses keypairs but the config file addresses the user
>>>> by name/host. How does gitosis connect the two together? Is it any
>>>> more complicated than the user detail at the end of the public key?
>>
>> The user@host at the end of the public key is mostly a comment. No
>> serious software would use it for authentication, since you can freely
>> edit it without changing the rest of the key.
>>
>>> Not much different. It uses the command feature of the authorized_keys
>>> file of ssh to limit access to the 'gitosis-serve' command which is
>>> given the username from the gitosis.conf as argument.
>>
>> ... the username -> key association being done in gitosis's
>> configuration itself (the key held in keydir/foobar is the one of user
>> foobar).
>
>
> Yes, I realise that the association is done im gitosis' config file,
> but that is exactly my question - how does that association work?
>
> To take a step back - I have to put a name (or a name@hostname) in the
> configuration file. How do I know what that should be in the general
> sense? When I create a key it doesn't ask me for the username I want
> so I see a disconnect here. Do I put a name, do I put name@hostname,
> does it matter and (again) how does it know which is 'my' public key?
> Is it the naming convention of the key or something magic? Plus, when
> I actually use gitosis, I am logging as the user 'git' so how does it
> know who I am? I am thoroughly confused by the whole thing. I'm
> probably missing something really obvious but, AFAIK, this is not
> covered at all in the docs.
>
> Thanks!
>
> Howard
>

Ahh... just read Heiko's post properly and actually looked at the authorized_keys file. This is now starting to make some sense. So the name in config has to match that sent to gitosis-server presumably. I still don't quite see the cause and effect. If I don't like being howard@x.y.z and would rather be just 'howard' what can I change? It tells me not to edit that file!

Previous: Howard MillerNext: Matthieu Moy
Message 5 of 9 in “How does gitosis know who the key belongs to”
  1. Howard MillerSep 24, 2009
  2. Heiko VoigtSep 24, 2009
  3. Matthieu MoySep 24, 2009
  4. Howard MillerSep 25, 2009
  5. Howard MillerSep 25, 2009
  6. Matthieu MoySep 25, 2009
  7. Howard MillerSep 25, 2009
  8. Heiko VoigtSep 25, 2009
  9. Sitaram ChamartySep 25, 2009

Read the whole thread, see it on lore, or plain text.

$ cat FOOTERMessages come from the public archive at lore.kernel.org/git, fetched every hour. The front page is chosen and written each morning by an AI editor and can be wrong; the threads themselves are the record. About and API. For agents: an MCP server at https://gitlist.dev/mcp, and any thread, story or person page as Markdown by adding .md to its URL (or sending Accept: text/markdown). Details in /llms.txt.