remembering passwords on a non-GUI server

[Karl Auer]

Embarrassingly, I realise I do not actually know how obe aspect of my
Ubuntu systems works: When I (for example) ssh to a remote server, my
local system automagically remembers the passphrase I used for my ssh
private key, and will not ask again for some time. sudo works the same
way, as does gpg, though they may all be using different methods to
achieve it.

When I am logged in to a vanilla Ubuntu server installation, with no
GUI, this doesn't happen, but I would *like* it to happen.

Google is not helping me; I only find outdated stuff about gnome-
keyring and various Linux password managers.

My (GUI) system is running gnome-keyring-daemon. There is also a thing
running on my system called gpg-agent, the exact function of which is
unclear. It has an ssh-agent mode, but the option to enable it is not
on its command line. And of course ssh-agent is running.

The server is not running any of those things. Just running them in
hopes that they work seems like  good way to lose access to my server
:-)

This is not a major problem; I can keep typing passphrases as often as
needed. It just seems like something someone would have fixed...

Regards, K.

-- 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Karl Auer (kauer at biplane.com.au)
http://www.biplane.com.au/kauer