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GWSL: Run graphical Linux apps in WSL

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Re: GWSL: Run graphical Linux apps in WSL

#101

Post by debaserab2 »

lanius wrote: post #98
uses wrote: post #82

When will Windows Linux happen? I genuinely don't understand the point of Windows as it exists anymore. * Games are developed on cross platform engines. I can't remember the last game I played that was Windows-exclusive. * Business apps work in the browser or Electron, or are otherwise cross-platform. Things that aren't, could work with emulation * Developers are using unix-like operating systems, and MS has leaned h…

> Games are developed on cross platform engines. I can't remember the last game I played that was Windows-exclusive. You may not play them, but a significant number of popular[1] games are Windows-only. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most-played_video_game...

Yeah - I'm not sure what GP is referring to, most new cross platform games that come out are xbox/ps/pc and very rarely will you see a linux or OS X release.

Re: GWSL: Run graphical Linux apps in WSL

#102

Post by folkrav »

voxic11 wrote: post #94
folkrav wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Until they allow USB passthrough (which is more or less blocked by the fact that Hyper-V itself doesn't seem to have the feature), a whole bunch of my use cases are basically barred from WSL2. Shame, cause otherwise I really, really enjoyed using it - coming from a guy who's been on Linux for 99% of his time for ~15 years at this point.

It seems many people find USB/IP works as a replacement for real USB passthrough http://usbip.sourceforge.net/

Found this guide a couple of days ago[1]. Looks awfully convoluted and impractical. Good if it works, but I personally draw my line of acceptable minimum functionality somewhere between "working" and "practical". This is a bit much, and has a couple of pretty bad gotchas, unfortunately.

[1] https://github.com/rpasek/usbip-wsl2-instructions

Re: GWSL: Run graphical Linux apps in WSL

#103

Post by quietbritishjim »

uses wrote: post #82

When will Windows Linux happen? I genuinely don't understand the point of Windows as it exists anymore. * Games are developed on cross platform engines. I can't remember the last game I played that was Windows-exclusive. * Business apps work in the browser or Electron, or are otherwise cross-platform. Things that aren't, could work with emulation * Developers are using unix-like operating systems, and MS has leaned h…

Microsoft Office is much better than the competition (including both LibreOffice and web apps like Google Docs). It's a great shame to say, but if I'm really honest with myself it's clear reality. Using Windows sucks, but Office is seriously so much better than everything else that it's worth it.

Re: GWSL: Run graphical Linux apps in WSL

#104

Post by ThinkBeat »

uses wrote: post #82

When will Windows Linux happen? I genuinely don't understand the point of Windows as it exists anymore. * Games are developed on cross platform engines. I can't remember the last game I played that was Windows-exclusive. * Business apps work in the browser or Electron, or are otherwise cross-platform. Things that aren't, could work with emulation * Developers are using unix-like operating systems, and MS has leaned h…

Why is there Pepsi? Coke Cola Classic has been the world best selling soft drink for over a decade and probably longe

People who want a Cola like drink prefer Coke.

Or even any other soft drinks than Cola derivates. They sell the most by far.

Why does Dr Pepper exist? Or Club-Mate? Or Tøyen Cola.

There is a concept called competition. People believe it drives innovation.

There is also nice to have variety and being able to pick something you like the best form a selection.

A single operating system dominating the entire world from PDP11 --> entirely is a bleak dystopia.

WindowsNT was lightyears ahead of Linux kernel when it come out. Async everything from the start. Better protection for hardware. Easily portable. x66, PowerPC, Alpha, Mips Able to run win32, OS/2 and a posix layer that could be extended into other adventures. Also the most modern operating out there in wide use.

It sadly has retrograded over time.

Both WindowsNT, Linux and BSD are all unsuited for the world we live in now.

I can't wait until some sharp minds are able to create the next generation operating system. It is taking far too long.

I loved the time of competition and variety Atari TOS/GEM, MSDos, VAX, OS2, OS/400, Sintran, Mac OS (System 1.0 -->), AmigaOS, WindowsNT, many flavours of UNIX, Sinclair BASIC

Those are just alternate operating systemsI have used myself over a life.

I want far more flavours, ideas, alternatives out there, not less.

Re: GWSL: Run graphical Linux apps in WSL

#105

Post by quietbritishjim »

DannyB2 wrote: post #91
zamadatix wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the question is "is there something technical preventing Microsoft from pivoting to a *nix kernel instead of NT" the answer is "no, and there hasn't been for at least 20 years - if ever".

Microsoft has already pivoted before. First was change from DOS based Windows to NT Kernel based Windows. Then again to Longhorn kernel based Windows.

The switch from from DOS-based Windows to NT took place over many years: development started in 1989, the first release was in 1993 and the switch only really completed in 2001 when Windows XP was released, which was the first NT release targetted at consumers. That's well over a decade. Microsoft bet a huge amount of resources on NT because they could see that DOS was never going to work on in the long term, especially on servers. There's no reason for them to spend so much resources and time on a switch a *nix kernel when there's (currently) nothing like that at stake with the NT kernel.

Longhorn was the codename for Vista, which just used the same NT kernel as before (with some feature improvements, just like in every new Windows release).

Re: GWSL: Run graphical Linux apps in WSL

#106

Post by raghava »

2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote: post #36
manojlds wrote: post #4

Isn't it officially coming anyway from Microsoft - https://www.theverge.com/2020/5/19/21263377/microsoft-window...

This will be a game changer if they flesh it out. Imagine Linux apps right alongside your windows apps with their own icons and everything. Windows Terminal + Visual Studio Code + WSL2 is the bee's knees.

All that goodness limited by networking troubles of WSL2 while on a VPN.

Wonder why it is never seen by WSL devs! Most of those trying to use WSL are running Windows, in a corp network, where a VPN is there by default.

Re: GWSL: Run graphical Linux apps in WSL

#107

Post by Tepix »

beowulfey wrote: post #19
Tepix wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Disable Access Control This was terrible advice back in the 90s and still is. An attacker anywhere on the network can listen to your input devices, insert fake keypresses, view your screen, etc. Basically a total system compromise. All without log entries. The correct way to do this is to use MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE. One the client host: $ xauth -extract - $DISPLAY Then copy the output. On the host running the X server: $…

Thank you for posting this. I tried many times to google how to do this and saw the magic cookie explanation, but never found a good clear description of what was happening. Much appreciated!

Glad to help.

Btw there is a typo, you need to use "nextract", it's too late to edit it now

Re: GWSL: Run graphical Linux apps in WSL

#108

Post by tracker1 »

uponcoffee wrote: post #65
temac wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love how WSL was put in the "command line" team and they are now doing graphics, GPU, and audio (plus probably Android again) :)

There was a story a few weeks back about Microsoft working on a new android subsystem. So truly coming full circle; android OS stability (via project treble), the vm approach instead of compatibility layer approach, and improvements to hardware sharing/passthrough to wsl 2 mean that they can finally realize what they tried to do with Projecy Astoria. They'll need to manage their own app store as I can't imagine they'…

At this point I could see how some developers may prefer an MS store for ios and android devices over the native stores. Especially if they make deeper cuts on pricing (10% of sales instead of 30% and 3% of transactions instead of 30%).

I'm slightly leery about it all, but definitely warming up to MS this past decade. WSL2 and VS Code have made my life much easier to say the least. Of course this is the intended effect, I no longer have the urgency to get into a full Linux environment this way.

On-Topic: glad to see this GWSL thing, as I'd been thinking about doing similar... getting X and pulseaudio working in windows, and configured right in WSL environment is a pain to say the least. If this eases that pain even if only for local logins, I'm pretty happy with it. I spent a couple days trying to get it all working... I could launch Ubuntu's Firefox instance, but couldn't for the life of me get audio working right and just gave up after a couple days.

Re: GWSL: Run graphical Linux apps in WSL

#109

Post by tracker1 »

1996 wrote: post #96
folkrav wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah it's actually pretty damn good. Performance was better than it was with WSL1 for me, at least (especially IO). IIRC they are exploring USB passthrough using Hyper-V sockets, but it's still very early to actually talk about having that included[1] Once they figure that out I might just as well be able to switch over and stop dual booting. I hate dual booting more than I hate Windows, so it would be an improvement…

> Performance was better than it was with WSL1 for me, at least (especially IO). WSL1 performance is better for CPU-bound problems WSL2 only shines due to the VHDX approach. If WSL1 could use a VHDX or (gasp!) a native partition in a native linux format, it would smoke WSL2.

Probably, but it also introduced a lot of edge cases for compatibility issues. I thought it was a reasonable approach, though likely took more devs than just supporting the more tightly integrated VM environments.

I will say that Docker Desktop works MUCH more smoothly with WSL2 than the prior approach.

About the only issue I see now is about once a month I have to reboot because the magic localhost port mapping between docker, wsl-ubuntu and native host goes wonky. It's not so bad as long as I realize before diving into a rabbit hole to figure out why I can't connect to something.

Re: GWSL: Run graphical Linux apps in WSL

#110

Post by kls »

jen20 wrote: post #87
uses wrote: post #82

When will Windows Linux happen? I genuinely don't understand the point of Windows as it exists anymore. * Games are developed on cross platform engines. I can't remember the last game I played that was Windows-exclusive. * Business apps work in the browser or Electron, or are otherwise cross-platform. Things that aren't, could work with emulation * Developers are using unix-like operating systems, and MS has leaned h…

I think may be very much underestimating the number of line of business apps built as Windows GUIs over the last 30 years - not to mention server software running on IIS and similar. I also think you're underestimating the number of developers who know Visual Studio and Windows and nothing else (many of whom are the so-called "dark matter" devs). On top of this, the NT kernel is actually pretty decent - despite the h…

On top of this, the NT kernel is actually pretty decent

A lot of people that where not in computing back then do not realize that Microsoft picked up a lot of great people due to market forces, they picked up a lot of talent from DEC including David Cutler and the cream of the crop from the OS2 team. This was the team that designed and built the original NT Kernel and it was by and large the best parts of VMS and OS2 coupled with those individuals learnings in building those other systems. I agree with you on the Win32 API and it is a shame that the NT Kernel gets dinged for it.

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