The default setup for the Mercurial DVCS on Windows with tortoisehg uses plink and Pageant to manage SSH keys when you are using ssh as the transport protocol for mercurial. That’s most likely the right choice for a normal Windows setup, but if you already have openssh installed and configured to talk to various servers, it’s easy to switch mercurial and tortoisehg to use openssh. It’s also very helpful if you’re forgetful like me and forget to start pageant, add new keys…