Azure Platform Series: Push to GitHub repo with 2FA from a Mac using Personal Access Token

This is another blog post in the series of how to #MakeStuffGo in Azure.

Background:

I have some code on my Mac. I need to put it into an empty GitHub repo for later deployment in Azure and I have to use a Personal Access Token (PAT). I was provided the URL of the repo and given the PAT so stored that in the keychain on my Mac.

#MakeStuffGo with PAT, GitHub and a Mac

1. Add the PAT into Keychain:
   
2. Create the Project Folder on the Mac:

   heymish$ mkdir devops-aks-middleware-api

3. Initialise the local git repo

   heymish$ cd devops-aks-middleware-api
   heymish$ git init

4. Add the remote git repository – I have called mine origin – it could be anything

   heymish$ git remote add origin https://github.com/<clientrepo>/devops-aks-middleware-api.git

5. Create a local branch

   heymish$ git checkout -b master

6. Do some stuff

   For me I was just copying in code that we had worked on so far – so copied that into the directory and did:

   git status
   <list of files that I've added>
   "nothing added to commit but untracked files present (use "git add" to track)"

7. Now we want to add those files to be added to our initial commit:

   heymish$ git add .
   heymish$ git commit -m "initial code commit"

8. Now comes the hard part – getting the 2FA stuff going with GitHub.

   a) we need to setup the GitHub email address we’ll use

   b) we need to setup the GitHub username we’ll use

   heymish$ git config --global user.email "hamishwatson59@clientx.com"
   heymish$ git config --global user.name "TheHamishWatson"

9. Now we will push our local changes to the remote branch.

   The -u flag indicates that we are pushing local changes upstream to origin

   git push -u origin master

10. This will now ask me for credentials – which is the PAT I stored in the keychain before:
    

    I type in the password for my keychain and I only click Allow – I’m ok to type in the password every time I need to auth to GitHub – I could click Always Allow – it’s just a personal thing.

11. Git will now push my local changes up to the repository and I can now start to edit code and collaborate with my clients developers.

So there you go – not too hard and things are nice and secure. There are other ways to use GitHub – ssh vs https which I’ve done here. But for https the above method using a Personal Access Token is pretty straightforward.

Yip.