Question
How to Generate SSH Key Pair on local machine (my computer)
- Posted January 16, 2016
- DigitalOcean ArticlesGetting StartedUbuntu
Hello,
I’m following this tutorial: digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/initial-server-setup-with-ubuntu-14-04
In step four “Add Public Key Authentication” it says “To generate a new key pair, enter the following command at the terminal of your local machine (ie. your computer)”
I enter “ssh-keygen” in my “command prompt” and receive the following error:
C:\Users\bkozlowski>ssh-keygen ‘ssh-keygen’ is not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program or batch file.
What am I doing wrong?
These answers are provided by our Community. If you find them useful, show some love by clicking the heart. If you run into issues leave a comment, or add your own answer to help others.
Try DigitalOcean for free
Click below to sign up and get $100 of credit to try our products over 60 days!
Hi @bkozlowski, welcome to the community.
I have just the answer for your question. The tutorial you saw was assuming that both the host and the server machines ran linux.
ssh-keygen is a UNIX only command and of course doesn’t work on a Windows computer.
There is a way around this using a program called PuTTYGen. I have a video on youtube that shows how to use it and then use PuTTY+Pagent to load your ey in and connect to the server. I also show how to add the key to the server from a Windows computer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p0BrVHZBViY&ab_channel=EverythingAppleProJr
Please let me know if you have any questions
-BeanJr
Hi,
These commands are for Linux/OS X systems. Since you’re running Windows, you’ll need to use PuTTy gen to generate the SSH keys and PuTTy to SSH into your Droplet.
Check out this tutorial: