Windows and Git ssh - permission denied - fails to prompt for key password

[Kissaki]

I can jj git clone from GitHub HTTPS fine, which works for read-only. However, when I try to clone via SSH, jj fails

jj git clone [email protected]:Kissaki/jj.git
Fetching into new repo in "C:\dev\jj\a\jj"
Error: Git process failed: External git program failed:
[email protected]: Permission denied (publickey).
fatal: Could not read from remote repository.

Please make sure you have the correct access rights
and the repository exists.

It does not seem to attempt to use my (password protected) ~/.ssh/id_rsa key, nor a system like TortoiseGit using pageant (putty authentication agent).

Is Git SSH on Windows not a covered use case? How is it supposed to work?

[yuja]

This might be an issue of Windows terminal. Maybe you can set up ssh-agent to work around the problem.
#5924

[jennings]

What version of jj are you using (jj version)? The latest is 0.31.0, and as of several versions ago jj now executes git to do the actual connection to the remote. If git fetch origin works, then jj git fetch --remote origin should too.

[Kissaki]

I am using Windows Terminal with Nushell.

$env.GIT_SSH_COMMAND = '"C:/Program Files/Git/usr/bin/ssh.exe" -vv'

git clone [email protected]:Kissaki/jj.git
…
debug2: pubkey_prepare: done
debug1: Offering public key: /c/Users/redacted/.ssh/id_rsa RSA SHA256:redacted
debug2: we sent a publickey packet, wait for reply
debug1: Server accepts key: /c/Users/redacted/.ssh/id_rsa RSA SHA256:redacted
Enter passphrase for key '/c/Users/redacted/.ssh/id_rsa':

jj git clone [email protected]:Kissaki/jj.git
…
debug2: pubkey_prepare: done
debug1: Offering public key: /c/Users/redacted/.ssh/id_rsa RSA SHA256:redacted
debug2: we sent a publickey packet, wait for reply
debug1: Server accepts key: /c/Users/redacted/.ssh/id_rsa RSA SHA256:redacted
debug1: read_passphrase: can't open /dev/tty: No such device or address
debug2: no passphrase given, try next key

[Kissaki]

I just tried in pwsh, also fails.

[jennings]

Oh, reaspassphrase getting involved means its finding the key file and trying to decrypt it.

As a sanity check, can you add your key to ssh-agent (as Yuya suggested) and see if it works that way?

[Kissaki]

How would I do that with Git for Windows?

Does that work only for git bash and only with autostart of it?

[Kissaki]

I was able to get it to work. Yes, if the key is already held in the git cred manager then it works.

[med1844]

Met the same issue, it seems to be caused by the ssh bundled in git.

On my end, ssh -vvT [email protected] shows it's using OpenSSH_for_Windows_9.5p2, LibreSSL 3.8.2, but $env.GIT_SSH_COMMAND = "ssh -vv" then jj git push shows it's using OpenSSH_9.6p1, OpenSSL 3.2.1 30 Jan 2024. It seems ssh is resolved to be the bundled one in git installation, instead of the one in windows.

Setting $env.GIT_SSH_COMMAND = "C:/Windows/System32/OpenSSH/ssh.exe" solved the problem for me. I guess git config --global core.sshCommand "..." would also work as long as you use the full path to the ssh, or output of which ssh.