fatal: could not read Username for 'https://github.com': No such file or directory

Question

Follow the steps to setup SSH keys here: https://help.github.com/articles/generating-ssh-keys

OR

git remote add origin https://{username}:{password}@github.com/{username}/project.git

Update: If you get "fatal: remote origin already exists." then you have to use set-url:

git remote set-url origin https://{username}:{password}@github.com/{username}/project.git

I faced the exact same problem. This problem occurred when I cloned using HTTPS URL and then tried to push the changes using Git Bash on Windows using:

git clone https://github.com/{username}/{repo}.git

However, when I used SSH URL to clone, this problem didn't occur:

git clone [email protected]:{username}/{repo}.git

I found my answer here:

edit ~/.gitconfig and add the following:

[url "[email protected]:"]
 insteadOf = https://github.com/

Although it solves a different problem, the error code is the same...

For me nothing worked from suggested above, I use the git pull command from Jenkins Shell Script and apparently it takes wrong user name. I spent ages before I found a way to fix it without switching to SSH.

In your the user's folder create .gitconfig file (if you don't have it already) and put your credentials in following format: https://user:[email protected], more info. After your .gitconfig file link to those credentials, in my case it was:

[credential]
   helper = store --file /Users/admin/.git-credentials

Now git will always use those credentials no matter what. I hope it will help someone, like it helped me.

Note that if you are getting this error instead:

fatal: could not read Username for 'https://github.com': No error

Then you need to update your Git to version 2.16 or later.

If you want to continue use https instead ssh, and avoid type into your username and password for security reason.

You can also try Github OAuth token, then you can do git config remote.origin.url 'https://{token}@github.com/{username}/{project}.git' or git remote add origin 'https://{token}@github.com/{username}/{project}.git'

This works for me!