135. Extract a Password from the Keychain  BEFORE YOU BEGIN 61 Keep Track of Websites with Bookmarks
 SEE ALSO 121 Change a User 's Password 136 Secure Your Files with FileVault
Anybody who has been on the Internet for any length of time knows what it's like to work with account passwords. Every website, every cooperative application, every email account, every online service has a password for you to remember. And your accounts don't even have the decency to all use the same usernames and passwords, because although your favorite username might have been available at one website, at another it might have been taken, forcing you to come up with a new variation on your name . Different websites have more or less stringent requirements for secure passwords, forcing you to think of multiple different passwords for different sites. Who can possibly keep all these passwords and usernames straight? Mac OS X can, using a feature called the Keychain . When you use the Keychain feature, you don't have to remember a single one of your passwords. All you have to remember is a single master password for your Keychain itself. After you've unlocked your Keychain, it will unlock all your individual logins on its own, automatically, when those login passwords are called for. Handily enough, the Keychain is automatically unlocked by the act of your logging in to your Mac OS X account. As you use Mac OS X, certain applications and websites will ask for passwords. When you enter a password in such a situation, a sheet appears in your browser that contains a Remember this password in my keychain check box that offers to add the password information to the Keychain for you. If you select this check box before logging in, the Keychain will fill out the password information for you the next time you open that application or site. However, you might later have to find out what your password for a given site or application was. You might have to change your password periodically, for exampleand everybody forgets passwords. It's just a fact of life. Fortunately, Mac OS X gives you access to the contents of your Keychain, using an application called Keychain Access . 135. Copy the Password to the Clipboard 
 TIP There's a lot more you can do with the Keychain Access application than simply extracting forgotten passwords; you can lock the system, customize which applications are explicitly allowed to access certain passwords (or "keys"), delete keys, change passwords, or create secure text notes that can be unlocked and read only if you know the Keychain password. Feel free to explore all the features in the Keychain Access utility!
| 1. | Launch the Keychain Access Application
In the Finder, navigate into the Applications folder and then into the Utilities folder; double-click the Keychain Access icon to launch the application.
| | 2. | Select the Password to Access
All the authentication keys that have been added to your Keychain are visible in the upper pane. Scroll through them until you find the one you want; you can view the details of an item in the lower pane by clicking it.
All different kinds of authentication keys are listed in the Keychain Access window; each is listed by its Kind , such as Internet password or application password . Use the Kind column or the Search box to zero in on the item you want to examine. When you find it, select it; information about that key appears in the fields at the bottom of the Keychain Access window when the Attributes tab is selected.
| | 3. | Authenticate to Show the Password While viewing the item information, click the Show password check box at the bottom of the window. A dialog box appears, prompting you for authentication. This is a security measure, ensuring that you are the rightful owner of this Keychain, and not someone who just came in and sat down at your computer while you were logged in already. Enter your Keychain password, which is usually the same as your Mac OS X login password (unless your login password was changed by an Admin user). TIP In Keychain authentication windows such as the one that appears here, you are given three options: Deny, Allow Once , and Always Allow . Click Deny to cancel the authentication, denying access to your Keychain to the application requesting it. Click Allow Once to authenticate the password for just this one instance (if you try to access the same information again in 10 seconds, you'll have to provide your password again). Click Always Allow to give the requesting application permanent access to your Keychain, until the computer is turned off or restarted. When you have successfully authenticated and unlocked the Keychain, the password for the account is shown in the field at the bottom of the window. | | 4. | Copy the Password to the Clipboard It can often be easier, especially with cryptic passwords made up of numbers and special punctuation characters , to copy and paste a password rather than having to key it in manually. Select the text of the password and choose Copy from the Edit menu, or press  , to copy the password into the area of memory known as the Clipboard. If you then switch to another application and choose Paste from the Edit menu (or press  ), the password is copied from the Clipboard into the application as though you'd typed it yourself. | | 5. | Add Password and Account Information to Your Keychain
As you're using any application that accesses protected services on the Internetsuch as Safari or Mailyou may be prompted on occasion to enter your password. In the dialog box or sheet where you type the password, you will usually see a check box labeled Remember this password in my keychain , or some similar variation. Select this check box to save the password in the Keychain when you click OK . The next time the application tries to access the protected resource, it will be able to get the password automatically from the Keychain instead of having to bug you for it.
If you enter an incorrect password, it is not entered into the Keychain.
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