Authenticate Git over HTTPS


Oct 11, 2019 - 3 min read

Today I needed to sync down a repository using git. So I went to look for my usual SSH authentication to pull down the repo but noticed that option isn’t available. the server doesn’t support SSH. Which means I had to use HTTPS, which is fine, I’ve used it before and it was pretty straight forward. I’ll just have to enter my credentials before every pulling or pushing. And then I ran git clone for the first time and ran into this:

Ok, what is this? Isn’t it supposed to just ask me for my credentials every time? And begins my search for how to get this working. Here are different ways I’ve found to save my information so I don’t have to type it again next time:

  • Git’s Credential Storage
  • Git Credential Manager (GCM)
  • Window’s Credential Manager
  • OSX Keychain

TLDR - Jump to “Window’s Credential Manager”. Oh and these are all for windows. I haven’t tried on a Mac yet.

Git’s Credential Storage

This is pretty straight forward and by far the simplest solution. Basically you choose between these commands:

  • The default (if credential.helper is unset) it will ask you for your credentials every time. You can unset by calling this: git config --global --unset credential.helper
  • git config --global credential.helper cache - saved in memory for 15 minutes
  • git config --global credential.helper store - saved as plain text on disk (permanent)

So I found what I want, which is the store option. BUT I don’t want to save it as plain text for security reasons. Someone can steal your entire repository if they can access the file. Just type cat ~/.git-credentials to find it 😎. You could specify a different location but it’s still in plain text. Let’s move on.

More info here: https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Tools-Credential-Storage

Git Credential Manager (GCM)

Ok I never got this to work but this is supposed to be the best as it allows multilevel authentication (such as 2FA). You have to install Git Credential Manager and it’s supposed to work right out of the box, silently. Sounds great but the installation fails and I ran out of patience. Will come back to it later in the future.

Theorectically, you would just have to set it to use GCM by calling git config --global credential.helper manager. Then make sure your GCM is installed by running git credential-manager install. And we’re set. But I was getting deployment error when trying to install GCM.

Window’s Credential Manager

This is the one I ended up using and it works for my case. And it was very easy.

  • Run git config --global credential.helper wincred.
  • Run git clone or git pull or any remote related git operation.
  • It’ll ask for your username and password.
  • Then it’s saved in the Credential Manager, ENCRYPTED.

OSX Keychain

This is for Mac only. Just set git config --global credential.helper osxkeychain. No other work is needed and it works great 😄

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