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Use the SSH Agent for tunnels

Choose SSH Agent under SSH authentication. DevOpsPad connects to the agent socket named in the SSH_AUTH_SOCK environment variable and offers the agent’s keys to the SSH server. No key file or passphrase is stored in DevOpsPad.

This works when the agent is visible to the desktop app. If it is not, DevOpsPad reports SSH Agent is unavailable; choose a private key or password and you should use a private key file instead.

Steps

  1. Make sure your key is loaded in the agent:

    ssh-add -l

    If it lists nothing, add the key, for example ssh-add ~/.ssh/id_ed25519. On macOS you can store the passphrase in the keychain with ssh-add --apple-use-keychain ~/.ssh/id_ed25519.

  2. In the connection dialog, check Connect through SSH tunnel and fill in SSH host, SSH port and SSH username.

  3. Set SSH authentication to SSH Agent.

  4. Configure host key verification. See verify host keys.

  5. Click Test connection, then Save connection.

Which agent is used

DevOpsPad reads SSH_AUTH_SOCK from its own process environment and talks to that Unix socket. On macOS, apps opened from Finder or the Dock usually inherit the system agent started by launchd, the same one ssh-add uses in Terminal.

DevOpsPad does not read ~/.ssh/config. If a password manager or another tool exposes its agent only through an IdentityAgent line in your SSH config, DevOpsPad will not find it. In that case, start DevOpsPad with SSH_AUTH_SOCK pointing at that socket, or use a private key file.

Errors

Message Cause
SSH Agent is unavailable; choose a private key or password SSH_AUTH_SOCK is not set for DevOpsPad
Cannot connect to SSH Agent The socket path exists in the variable but the agent is not running or not reachable
SSH connection failed: … unable to authenticate The agent has no key the server accepts; check ssh-add -l

Limits

  • Unix socket agents only. The Windows OpenSSH agent named pipe and Pageant are not supported.
  • Agent forwarding to the bastion is not used; the agent only authenticates DevOpsPad to the SSH server.

Frequently asked questions

Does DevOpsPad read IdentityAgent from my SSH config?

No. It does not read ~/.ssh/config. It only uses the agent socket in the SSH_AUTH_SOCK environment variable of the DevOpsPad process.