I have a new ssh key problem. I have successfully used them for years with Heroku, Git and other servers so I can login without having to issue a passphrase.

A few weeks ago, I was unable to push a git repository on my machine to my Heroku and it responded with Permission denied (publickey).

Hmm. Everything else but this Heroku function still works. So I

 ssh-keygen -t rsa -C "newHeroku"

with no passphrase (hit return so it would be empty). So I enter:

 sudo chmod 600 ~/.ssh/newHeroku*

Then:

ssh-add ~/.ssh/newHeroku.pub

Returning return for the passphrase asked it exits without error. The next step is to:

 ssh-add /Users/sam/.ssh/newHeroku.pub

To verify that it's "live" I enter:

 ssh-add -l

To which the output is still The agent has no identities. Okay, to eliminate variables, I repeat the key generation process but entering in a passphrase for a new key. I ssh-add the new key and get the "Enter passphrase" as expected. Now this is why I'm posting here and not on a Heroku blog because ssh-add fails because the passphrase I used keeps getting rejected. It appears, even though I have no problem with my keys elsewhere, that something is wrong with passphrase because even though I get no errors, I get errors when on the one that expects a passphrase. One question, should I expect the Passphrase request for ssh-add when I have not generated a passphrase? It's been suggested that this is a clue and I offer it.

Or maybe I have a poor understanding of what ssh-add is doing. Wouldn't be the first time I asked a stupid Q. Also, I'm on Lion and have updated no system updates in the few weeks of this period except application updates.