Git error - gpg failed to sign data

Question

I just started using git and I install git and gpg via homebrew. For some reason, I get this error when i do git commit I looked at so many other stackoverflow questions regarding this topic and none of them worked for me. How can I fix this error so that I can upload successfully.

error: gpg failed to sign the data
fatal: failed to write commit object

Answer 1

For troubleshooting, two things to first try:

• run git config --global gpg.program gpg2, to make sure git uses gpg2 and not gpg
• run echo "test" | gpg2 --clearsign, to make sure gpg2 itself is working

If that all looks all right, one next thing to try:

• run brew install pinentry to ensure you have a good tool installed for passphrase entry

If after that install and you re-try git commit and still get the "failed to sign the data" error:

• run gpgconf --kill gpg-agent to kill any running agent that might be hung

If that says gpgconf isn’t installed or doesn’t have a --kill option, you might try this:

1. cp ~/.gnupg ~/.gnupg-GOOD to save a copy of your ~/.gnupg to revert to later if needed
2. brew install gnupg21 to install GnuPG 2.1

The reason for saving a copy of your ~/.gnupg dir is that GnuPG 2.1 potentially creates/changes some key data in way that isn’t backward-compatible with GnuPG 2.0 and earlier, so if you want to go back later, you can do mv ~/.gnupg ~/.gnupg21 && mv ~/.gnupg-GOOD ~/.gnupg.

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Otherwise there are some basic steps to run to check you’ve got a working GnuPG environment:

• run gpg2 -K --keyid-format SHORT, to check that you have at least one key pair

If the output of that shows you have no secret key for GnuPG to use, then you need to create one:

• run gpg2 --gen-key, to have GnuPG walk you through the steps for creating a key pair

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If you get an error message saying “Inappropriate ioctl for device”, do this:

• run export GPG_TTY=$(tty) and/or add that to your ~/.bashrc or ˜/.bash_profile