Create Launchpad user

To create a new Launchpad user

Add public key certificate

To upload code to Launchpad your code must be signed by a public key certificate.

You could use an existing certificate or create a new OpenPGP key pair:

gpg --default-new-key-algo rsa4096 --gen-key

Now list your keys:

gpg --list-secret-keys
------------------------------
sec   rsa4096/0E5187163D609A71 2024-11-22 [SC] [expires: 2027-11-22]
      Key fingerprint = E673 1759 54C6 F670 0DA0  3CB0 0E51 8716 3D60 9A71
uid                 [ultimate] John Doe <[email protected]>

Take note of the Key fingerprint line.

Publish the public key. Keyid is the 0E5187163D609A71 string in the example above.

gpg --send-keys --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com <keyid>

Now add your public key to your user in Launchpad. On your user page https://launchpad.net/~<username> you can find a button labeled OpenPGP keys: or you can directly navigate to https://launchpad.net/~<username>/+editpgpkeys.

Enter your fingerprint and press the Import Key button.

Add SSH key

For uploading code to a private PPA or to Git repository on Launchpad you need an SSH key pair. You can generate one with:

ssh-keygen -t rsa -b 4096

To avoid abuse add a passphrase.

The key pair is stored in the .ssh directory of your home directory, e.g.

find ~/.ssh
/home/user/.ssh
/home/user/.ssh/id_rsa.pub
/home/user/.ssh/id_rsa

Now add your public key to your user in Launchpad. On your user page https://launchpad.net/~<username> you can find a button labeled SSH keys: or you can directly navigate to https://launchpad.net/~<username>/+sshkeys.

Enter the content of the public key (id_rsa.pub in the example) and press the Import Public Key button.