For those of you who already use PuTTY: Here’s a little improvement that’s surprisingly little known. Probably because it is very hard to explain. But I’ll try.

Here is how you can avoid starting programs, entering login information or indeed typing passwords when you use PuTTY:

1. Download Putty installer from the PuTTY Download Page. Make sure to grab the “Installer”
2. Install Putty
3. Start PuttyGen from Start -> PuTTY-> PuttyGen
4. Generate a new key and save it as a .ppk file without a passphrase
5. Use Putty to login to the server you want to connect to
6. Append the Public Key text from PuttyGen to the text of ~/.ssh/authorized_keys
7. Create a shortcut to your .ppk file from Start -> Putty to Start -> Startup
8. Select the .ppk shortcut from the Startup menu (this will happen automatically at every startup)
9. See the Pageant icon in the system tray? Right-click it and select “New session”
10. Enter username@hostname in the “Host name” field
11. You will now log in automatically.

This process is a bit hard to explain, so I have made a short video that explains it:

In order to streamline things even more, notice how Saved sessions show up under the Pageant icon in your system tray.