If you want to connect to a svn repository server in mac, here is what you should set up ssh configuration files under ~/.ssh/config

.ssh is a hidden folder, under that you have a config files
open the config file using the following command or you could use any editor you like to open the file

open ~/.ssh/config

Put the following configuration in the file:

Host your_svn_host_name
  User user_name_to_the_host
  IdentityFile ~/.ssh/id_rsa
  IdentitiesOnly yes

Here is the explanation to the settings. You can find it when you do

man ssh_config

IdentityFile
It is a private file that the ssh will use to connect to your svn repository servers. If you didn’t specify this. It will prompt you to enter the password to connect to the server instead. Here is the explanation after running ‘man ssh_config’: Specifies a file from which the user’s RSA or DSA authentication identity is read. The default is ~/.ssh/identity for protocol version 1, and ~/.ssh/id_rsa and ~/.ssh/id_dsa for protocol version 2. Additionally, any identities represented by the authentication agent will be used for authentication. The file name may use the tilde syntax to refer to a user’s home directory. It is possible to have multiple identity files specified in configuration files; all these identities will be tried in sequence. If you want to specify a different identity files, just change the name of the file under IdentityFile.

Do note that the id_rsa file must have the proper permission settings, otherwise when you run the following command to connect to your svn server:

ssh you_host_name

You will see the following error:

Permissions 0755 for ‘~/.ssh/id_rsa’ are too open.
It is recommended that your private key files are NOT accessible by others.
This private key will be ignored.

When you see this, you should set the permission back to default, so it can only have read access by you.

chmod 600 ~/.ssh/id_rsa

Now you should be able to connect to your svn repository.