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Version: 24.1

SSH credentials

SSH public key authentication relies on asymmetric cryptography to generate a public and private key pair. The public key remains on the target (remote) machine, while the private key (and passphrase) is stored in Seqera Platform as a credential. The key pair is used to authenticate a connection with your SSH-enabled environment.

To preserve individual user identities by using multiple user SSH credentials to access your HPC compute environments, see Managed identities.

All credentials are (AES-256) encrypted before secure storage and not exposed in an unencrypted way by any Seqera API.

Create an SSH key pair​

To use SSH public key authentication:

  • The remote system must have a version of SSH installed. This guide assumes the remote system uses OpenSSH. If you're using a different version of SSH, the key generation steps may differ.
  • The SSH public key must be present on the remote system (usually in ~/.ssh/authorized_keys).

To generate an SSH key pair:

  1. From the target machine, open a terminal window and run ssh-keygen.
  2. Follow the prompts to:
    • Specify a file path and name (or keep the default).
    • Specify a passphrase (recommended).
  3. Navigate to the target folder (default /home/user/.ssh/id_rsa) and open the private key file with a plain text editor.
  4. Copy the private key file contents before navigating to Seqera.

Create an SSH credential in Seqera​

  1. Add your credentials to your organization or personal workspace:

    • From an organization workspace: Go to Credentials > Add Credentials.
    • From your personal workspace: From the user menu, go to Your credentials > Add credentials.

  2. Complete the following fields:

    • Name: A unique name for the credentials using alphanumeric characters, dashes, or underscores. For example, my-ssh-creds.
    • Provider: Select SSH.
    • SSH private key: Paste the SSH private key file contents. Include the -----BEGIN OPENSSH PRIVATE KEY----- and -----END OPENSSH PRIVATE KEY----- lines.
    • Passphrase: The SSH private key passphrase (recommended). If your key pair was created without a passphrase, leave this blank.

  3. After you've completed all the form fields, select Add. The new credential is now listed under the Credentials tab.