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Overview

SSH keys are how you get into a new machine. You register the public half of a key pair here, then attach it while creating a virtual machine. Simnet never sees your private key.
Navigation: Compute → SSH Keys. Titled SSH Keys, subtitled “Manage SSH key pairs for VM access”.
Register a key before you create your first machine. Attaching one at create time is trivial; recovering a machine built without one is not — password reset requires the template to support it and the machine to be stopped.

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Summary cards

Algorithm is a fixed label describing the fingerprint hash, not a property of your keys. It reads SHA-256 regardless of what you registered, so don’t use it to tell an Ed25519 key from an RSA one.

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Columns

Status is hard-coded to Active for every row. It is not derived from data, so it can’t tell you a key is unused, expired, or broken. Treat the column as decoration.
The header also shows a count and a refresh button, and a section heading reads All SSH Keys ({n}).

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Row actions

Clicking anywhere on a row also copies its fingerprint and confirms with “Fingerprint copied”.
Deleting a key does not remove it from machines already built with it. Those machines keep the key in their authorized_keys and stay reachable by whoever holds the private half. To revoke real access, remove the key inside the machine as well.

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Generating a key pair

Simnet stores what you give it, so generate the pair locally first. Ed25519 is the current default choice — smaller and faster than RSA at equivalent strength.
Paste only the .pub file. The file without .pub is your private key and must never leave your machine or be pasted into any web form, including this one.

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Worked example: from key to shell

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Generate the pair locally

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Register the public half

New SSH Key, give it a name you’ll recognise later — ops-laptop beats key1 — and paste the contents of simnet_ed25519.pub.
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Confirm it registered correctly

Compare the Fingerprint column against ssh-keygen -lf ~/.ssh/simnet_ed25519.pub. They should match.
4

Attach it while creating a machine

On the wizard’s SSH Keys step, select ops-laptop. See Virtual Machines.
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Connect once the machine has an address

The username comes from the template — commonly ubuntu on Ubuntu images, rocky on Rocky, ec2-user or cloud-user on others. The machine needs a public IP and an open port 22; see Public IPs and Firewall Policies.
Add a host entry so you don’t retype the key path:
Then ssh simnet-web.

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Empty and error states

Load failures surface the platform’s own error message rather than a generic one.

Virtual Machines

Attach a key on the wizard’s SSH Keys step.

Firewall Policies

Open port 22 to the addresses you actually connect from.