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Feel free to have your own workflow but git already addresses this tools entire purpose with includeIf.<p>what does this address that includeIf does not?
Solving the problem of having a personal and a work GitHub account is really trivial without any extra tools. All you need is a dedicated SSH key for that GitHub account. (And why would you have a password for a ssh key on your personal machine?)<p>~/.ssh/config<p><pre><code> Host github.com-work
HostName github.com
User git
IdentityFile ~/.ssh/work_id_rsa
IdentitiesOnly yes
</code></pre>
~/.git/config<p><pre><code> [user]
email = work@example.com
[remote "origin"]
url = github.com-work:Work/Widget.git</code></pre>
Which works for a while, until you have a bunch of projects under various identities.<p>In my main ~/.gitconfig I have:<p><pre><code> [includeIf "gitdir:/home/user/projects/embedding-shapes/"]
path = /home/user/.gitconfig-embedding-shapes
</code></pre>
Where basically `projects/` follow GitHub naming with $user/$repo, so I set the git identity based on all projects within that user, rather than repo-by-repo which would get cumbersome fast.<p>Then you just make sure you're in the right directory :)
This. I’ve seen so many tools solving problems that already have solutions lately because LLMs allow people to run off and “fix” the problem their way before they can a chance to discover existing, more appropriate solutions.<p>The next step of this problem space is: “when I’m working on project X, I often forget to change my GitHub user with Gitas” so now they need direnv or something to switch it for them. The original solution foresaw this - so is far more complete that Gitas already _and_ built into git itself.<p>But, LLMs, so here we are, slowly drowning in a growing ocean of software built by the unaware.
I use that approach. I also make sure to not set the [user] section in my main config (and only in the included files). That way if I'm operating outside of one of my user directories git commit fails due to having no user details.
> (And why would you have a password for a ssh key on your personal machine?)<p>You're presumably joking? If not, could you elaborate?
If you don't want to bother with directories or want to use https instead of ssh, you can do remote url based dispatch in your gitconfig:<p><pre><code> [credential "https://github.com/org1"]
useHttpPath = true
helper =
helper = /path/to/auth.sh user1
[includeIf "hasconfig:remote.*.url:https//github.com/org1/**"]
path = user1.gitconfig
; set name / email in user1.gitconfig
</code></pre>
where auth.sh is something that can produce the right token for the given user, e.g.<p><pre><code> #!/bin/bash
echo "username=$1"
echo "password=$(gh auth token --user $1)"</code></pre>
Are there any good reasons to use multiple GitHub user accounts? GitHub organization membership and permissions are well designed in my experience, negating the need for multiple user accounts.
Consultants or professional services folks will be working in their company’s GitHub account and several clients. Requires managing lots of git/GitHub accounts
> Are there any good reasons to use multiple GitHub user accounts?<p>Is there any good reasons not to separate what you work on into multiple GitHub accounts? Not to mention some people don't want all their projects attached to one profile, some people also develop in their free-time, and don't want to mix freetime/work projects under the same user account, for multiple reasons.
A why not<p>B if you ever be in a company using the half baked GitHub hosted enterprise….
I use a pseudonym during my free time, so yes. Also my employer is requiring us to use company-specific GitHub accounts, so the decision is out of my hands anyway.
Is this that dropbox moment again? Anyway on Windows I keep a separate work and personal profile and GitHub auth doesn't go between them.
For Claude Code users:<p>- using alternative host is not supported when roaming between local and cloud, fix is to add another origin you don’t use but use GitHub.com url<p>- CC uses gh command, which still needs account switch, this can be solved by add the switch to CC hook.
You can put [user] blocks in repos, i.e.<p><pre><code> /some/where $ head .git/config
[user]
email = me@example.org
name = My 'nick' Name
</code></pre>
Doesn't tie into your SSH key though, if you need that.
Git<i>hub</i> account switching. A git account is not an idea that makes sense.
It's actually about <i>git</i> account switching as far as I can tell, which does make sense, you can have multiple "git" users indeed. Maybe it's the wording that is wrong? Read "account" as "user" and it might make more sense :)<p><pre><code> # in ~/.gitconfig
[includeIf "gitdir:/home/user/projects/embedding-shapes/"]
path = /home/user/.gitconfig-embedding-shapes
# in ~/.gitconfig-embedding-shapes
[user]
name = embedding-shapes
email = embedding-shapes@proton.me
[core]
sshCommand = ssh -i /home/user/.ssh/id_embedding-shapes
</code></pre>
That's one of my git "accounts", currently I have four in total, one being my "real identity", other are pseudo-anonymous users.
Yeah. Unfortunately, just goes to show how many people think Git = Github.
you can have per repo and per directory git config via git conditional includes<p><pre><code> [includeIf "hasconfig:remote.*.url:https://*.github.com/**"]
path = /home/xani/src/gh/.gitconfig</code></pre>
For the use case of "use different accounts / configs for different directories", git's config has includeIf.
I used to have a git post-checkout hook that set the repo identity based on the repo origin url [0] on checkout - maybe there's some post-clone hook these days, but 10 years ago when I wrote it there was only post-checkout hook.<p>[0] <a href="https://www.dvratil.cz/2015/12/git-trick-%23628-automatically-set-commit-author-based-on-repo-url/" rel="nofollow">https://www.dvratil.cz/2015/12/git-trick-%23628-automaticall...</a>
Lovley, was looking for exactly that for some time. Will definitely try it, thanks for sharing!
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