Pass

pass is a simple password manager for the command line. Passwords are stored inside gpg encrypted files in a simple directory tree structure. Basically pass is a shell script that makes use of existing tools like gnupg, pwgen, tree & git and can therefore be considered less "bloated" than alternatives like e.g. keepass

Installation

Install pass, available in the official repositories.

Basic usage

Note: To be able to use pass you need to set up gnupg as described in GnuPG#Basic keys management
  • Initialize the password store
$ pass init <gpg-id or email>
  • Insert password, providing a descriptive hierarchical name
$ pass insert archlinux.org/wiki/username
  • Get a view of the password store
$ pass
Password Store
└── archlinux.org
    └── wiki
        └── username
  • Generate a new random password, where <n> is the desired password length as a number.
$ pass generate archlinux.org/wiki/username <n>
  • Retrieve password, you will be prompted for the gpg passphrase
$ pass archlinux.org/wiki/username
  • If you're using Xorg and have xclip installed, the retrieved password can be put on the clipboard temporarily to paste into web forms via:
$ pass -c archlinux.org/wiki/username

Migrating to pass

There are multiple scripts listed on the pass-project page to import passwords from other programs

GUI

There is now an open beta of qtpass available on the AUR.

See also