7.5. Using Public Key Authentication

Home Prev	InCenter 2.2.5 On-Premises Administration Guide	Next

Instead of using a username and password credential pair for authentication when connecting, a node can be set up to use SSH Public Key Authentication. Doing this in the node is described on the section entitled SSH and SCP with Public Key Authentication in the separate cOS Core Administration Guide for the node. Once this is set up, the following steps can be used to add the node to InCenter:

Upload the private key file to InCenter using SCP or SFTP.
Create a SSHPrivateKey object for the uploaded file. This can be done using the CLI:
```
admin@InCenter:/> add SSHPrivateKey
			Name=my-key
			KeyData=my-private.key
```
Note that the KeyData value for the SSHPrivateKey object could be entered directly as a base64 encoded string, without uploading a key file. However, using a file is more convenient. If a file is used, its filetype must be either .key or .pem.
Add the node to InCenter, specifying the authentication method as PublicKey.

Note that if the node had already been added with a username and password, authentication could be changed to use public key authentication by changing its properties.