[windows] Git - How to use .netrc file on Windows to save user and password

Is it possible to use a .netrc file on Windows when I'm using Git to clone a remote repository with HTTP and user - password?

This question is related to windows git authentication

The answer is


You can also install Git Credential Manager for Windows to save Git passwords in Windows credentials manager instead of _netrc. This is a more secure way to store passwords.


This will let Git authenticate on HTTPS using .netrc:

  • The file should be named _netrc and located in c:\Users\<username>.
  • You will need to set an environment variable called HOME=%USERPROFILE% (set system-wide environment variables using the System option in the control panel. Depending on the version of Windows, you may need to select "Advanced Options".).
  • The password stored in the _netrc file cannot contain spaces (quoting the password will not work).

I am posting a way to use _netrc to download materials from the site www.course.com.

If someone is going to use the coursera-dl to download the open-class materials on www.coursera.com, and on the Windows OS someone wants to use a file like ".netrc" which is in like-Unix OS to add the option -n instead of -U <username> -P <password> for convenience. He/she can do it like this:

  1. Check the home path on Windows OS: setx HOME %USERPROFILE%(refer to VonC's answer). It will save the HOME environment variable as C:\Users\"username".

  2. Locate into the directory C:\Users\"username" and create a file name _netrc.NOTE: there is NOT any suffix. the content is like: machine coursera-dl login <user> password <pass>

  3. Use a command like coursera-dl -n --path PATH <course name> to download the class materials. More coursera-dl options details for this page.


Examples related to windows

"Permission Denied" trying to run Python on Windows 10 A fatal error occurred while creating a TLS client credential. The internal error state is 10013 How to install OpenJDK 11 on Windows? I can't install pyaudio on Windows? How to solve "error: Microsoft Visual C++ 14.0 is required."? git clone: Authentication failed for <URL> How to avoid the "Windows Defender SmartScreen prevented an unrecognized app from starting warning" XCOPY: Overwrite all without prompt in BATCH Laravel 5 show ErrorException file_put_contents failed to open stream: No such file or directory how to open Jupyter notebook in chrome on windows Tensorflow import error: No module named 'tensorflow'

Examples related to git

Does the target directory for a git clone have to match the repo name? Git fatal: protocol 'https' is not supported Git is not working after macOS Update (xcrun: error: invalid active developer path (/Library/Developer/CommandLineTools) git clone: Authentication failed for <URL> destination path already exists and is not an empty directory SSL_connect: SSL_ERROR_SYSCALL in connection to github.com:443 GitLab remote: HTTP Basic: Access denied and fatal Authentication How can I switch to another branch in git? VS 2017 Git Local Commit DB.lock error on every commit How to remove an unpushed outgoing commit in Visual Studio?

Examples related to authentication

Set cookies for cross origin requests How Spring Security Filter Chain works What are the main differences between JWT and OAuth authentication? http post - how to send Authorization header? ASP.NET Core Web API Authentication Token based authentication in Web API without any user interface Custom Authentication in ASP.Net-Core Basic Authentication Using JavaScript Adding ASP.NET MVC5 Identity Authentication to an existing project LDAP: error code 49 - 80090308: LdapErr: DSID-0C0903A9, comment: AcceptSecurityContext error, data 52e, v1db1