# Prompting for private key location when developing a private repo

**URL:** <https://discourse.julialang.org/t/prompting-for-private-key-location-when-developing-a-private-repo/91035>\
**Category:** General Usage\
**Tags:** pkg, github\
**Created:** [November 30, 2022, 8:01am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/prompting-for-private-key-location-when-developing-a-private-repo/91035 "2022-11-30T08:01:09Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![kai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/cc9497/32.png) [@kai](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/kai)\
**Post date:** [November 30, 2022, 8:01am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/prompting-for-private-key-location-when-developing-a-private-repo/91035/1 "2022-11-30T08:01:09Z")

</div>

I’m trying to develop a private repo without success. Here is what I tried:

First generated a id\_ed25519 key. Typing

`dev “git@github.com:username/mypackage.jl.git”`

gives

`Private key location for 'git@github.com': `

Following [this link](https://github.com/GunnarFarneback/LocalRegistry.jl/blob/master/docs/ssh_keys.md), I set ` JULIA_PKG_USE_CLI_GIT=true` and tried again, but got the same prompt.

Following [this suggestion](https://github.com/JuliaLang/Pkg.jl/issues/911#issuecomment-515631128), I added `-m PEM` when generating the key, repeated the above steps, but got the same error message.

Any suggestions?

```julia
julia> versioninfo()
Julia Version 1.8.2
Commit 36034abf260 (2022-09-29 15:21 UTC)
Platform Info:
  OS: macOS (arm64-apple-darwin21.3.0)
  CPU: 10 × Apple M1 Pro
  WORD_SIZE: 64
  LIBM: libopenlibm
  LLVM: libLLVM-13.0.1 (ORCJIT, apple-m1)
  Threads: 1 on 8 virtual cores

```

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![GunnarFarneback](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/gunnarfarneback/32/1827_2.png) [@GunnarFarneback](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/GunnarFarneback)\
**Post date:** [November 30, 2022, 9:15am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/prompting-for-private-key-location-when-developing-a-private-repo/91035/2 "2022-11-30T09:15:54Z")

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Mandatory control question: Can you `git clone` your repo outside of Julia?

> [@kai](#):
>
> Following [this link](https://github.com/GunnarFarneback/LocalRegistry.jl/blob/master/docs/ssh_keys.md), I set ` JULIA_PKG_USE_CLI_GIT=true` and tried again, but got the same prompt.

If you got the same prompt, you failed to set the environment variable effectively. Can you see it with `ENV["JULIA_PKG_USE_CLI_GIT"]` in your Julia session?

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![kai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/cc9497/32.png) [@kai](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/kai)\
**Post date:** [November 30, 2022, 12:32pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/prompting-for-private-key-location-when-developing-a-private-repo/91035/3 "2022-11-30T12:32:52Z")

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Indeed I didn’t set `JULIA_PKG_USE_CLI_GIT=true` effectively. After it is addressed,

`dev “git@github.com:username/mypackage.jl.git”`

works fine even without `-m PEM`.

Thank you.