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The Windows Subsystem for Linux is now open source

blogs.windows.com

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Re: The Windows Subsystem for Linux is now open source

#491

Post by CoolCold »

Conscat wrote: post #429
elif wrote: post #7

Every time I praise WSL on hn I pay the karma tax but I will die on this hill. WSL is more powerful than Linux because of how easy it is to run multiple OS on the same computer simultaneously. It's as powerful as Linux with some janky custom local docker wrappers for device support, local storage mapping, and network mapping. Except it's not janky at all. It's an absolute delight to use, out of the box, on a desktop…

I'm sure that feature is important for whatever works you're doing, but that's a feature I've _never_ desired, and WSL is missing plenty of features that are important for my work. Hardware performance counters basically do not work in WSL2, which among other issues, makes it extremely difficult to use rr. https://github.com/rr-debugger/rr/issues/2506#issuecomment-2... Some people say they got it working, but I and m…

> I can imagine that WSL2 looks attractive if all you want to do is run command line apps in multiple isolated environments, but it is miserable for anything graphical or interactive.

Indeed, that's my case - using CLI mostly for ssh/curls/ansible/vim over ansible and Puppet, so on.

For GUI part, Windows is chosen and shines for me.

Re: The Windows Subsystem for Linux is now open source

#492

Post by Joel_Mckay »

jve wrote: post #398

Sec guy (who was mainly a linux guy) was never happy to let people use WSL in corp due to security bugs. Can anyone chime in - is this still a concern? Was it ever a concern?

QEMU has win64 builds, and the guest OS can access SAMBA/NFS/SSHFS host shares. Getting guest OS hypervisor to work is soft locked on Home licensed windows, so options are often limited to Win guests on linux hosts.

In general, the utilities on posix systems heavily rely on a standardized permission and path structure fundamentally different than windows registry paradigms.

Even something as simple as curl... while incredibly useful on windows, also opens a scripting ecosystem that side-channels Microsoft signing protections etc.

Linux VM disk image files can be very small (some are just a few MB), simply copied to a physical drive/host later given there is no DRM/Key locks, and avoids mixing utf8 with windows codepage.

Mixing ecosystems creates a Polyglot, and that is going to have problems for sure... given neither ecosystems wants the cost of supporting the other.

Best method, use cross platform application ports supported on every platform. In my opinion, Windows should only be used for games and industry specific commercial software support. For robust system privacy there are better options now, that aren't booby-trapped for new users. =3

Re: The Windows Subsystem for Linux is now open source

#493

Post by dustedcodes »

elif wrote: post #7

Every time I praise WSL on hn I pay the karma tax but I will die on this hill. WSL is more powerful than Linux because of how easy it is to run multiple OS on the same computer simultaneously. It's as powerful as Linux with some janky custom local docker wrappers for device support, local storage mapping, and network mapping. Except it's not janky at all. It's an absolute delight to use, out of the box, on a desktop…

I tried it and found it to be such an abomination. I can’t understand why any self respecting software developer would use Windows with a bastard linux like WSL instead of just using actual Linux. Feels like a massive skill issue.

Re: The Windows Subsystem for Linux is now open source

#494

Post by dazhbog »

everdrive wrote: post #488

I'm not be sarcastic or funny when I ask this. Why isn't this called the Linux subsystem for Windows? It seems like a Linux subsystem running on Windows. If it were the other way around, (ie, a Windows Subsystem for Linux) I'd think that Linux would be the primary OS, and something like WINE would the subsystem.

Management or marketing needs "Windows" to be the first word when people write articles about it..

Re: The Windows Subsystem for Linux is now open source

#495

Post by hoppp »

wpm wrote: post #381
yndoendo wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My development is mainly Windows and I prefer Linux host with Windows VM guests. The experience is more stable and I can revert to a snapshot when Windows or Microsoft product update brakes something or new test configuration does. It also allows to backup and retain multiple QA environments that are rarely used, like a client's Oracle DB. It is nice being able to save the VM state at the end of the week and shut it…

> Windows has known issues of waking a sleeping laptop. Doesn't Linux as well?

I recall having a sleep issue with linux 15 years ago, I think its been fixed long ago, except maybe on some very new hardware or if you install the wrong linux on an M series Mac you could have issues with sleep.

Re: The Windows Subsystem for Linux is now open source

#497

Post by Scarbutt »

nickjj wrote: post #268
elif wrote: post #7

Every time I praise WSL on hn I pay the karma tax but I will die on this hill. WSL is more powerful than Linux because of how easy it is to run multiple OS on the same computer simultaneously. It's as powerful as Linux with some janky custom local docker wrappers for device support, local storage mapping, and network mapping. Except it's not janky at all. It's an absolute delight to use, out of the box, on a desktop…

> It's an absolute delight to use, out of the box, on a desktop or laptop, with no configuration required. I have been using it since the beginning of WSL 1 with a very terminal heavy set up but it has some issues. For example WSLg's clipboard sharing is buggy compared to VcXsrv. It doesn't handle pasting into Linux apps without introducing Windows CRs. I opened an issue for this https://github.com/microsoft/wslg/iss…

Also, systemd is still pretty sketchy. It takes over 2 minutes for systemd services to start and if you close a WSL 2 terminal for just a few minutes systemd will delay a new terminal from opening for quite some time. This basically means disabling systemd to use WSL 2 in your day to day.

That doesn't sound good. I was planning to set up a Windows/WSL2 box, but this gives me second thoughts. Where can I read more about this?

Re: The Windows Subsystem for Linux is now open source

#498

Post by burnte »

everdrive wrote: post #488

I'm not be sarcastic or funny when I ask this. Why isn't this called the Linux subsystem for Windows? It seems like a Linux subsystem running on Windows. If it were the other way around, (ie, a Windows Subsystem for Linux) I'd think that Linux would be the primary OS, and something like WINE would the subsystem.

Trademark law. They'd have to license the TM to have a product name that leads with another entity's trademark.

Re: The Windows Subsystem for Linux is now open source

#499

Post by burnte »

stevenwoo wrote: post #128
Night_Thastus wrote: post #92

I've been using WSL on and off for Linux development for the last few years. When it works, it's great! When it doesn't....oh man it sucks. It has been non-stop networking and VPN problems, XServer issues, window scaling issues, hardware accelerated graphics not working, etc. this whole time. I've spent more time trying to fix WSL issues then actually developing software. It's never gotten better. It's fast. It's pow…

I think I'm still on a beta version because I'm afraid to update it and breaking all the stuff I have working.

The beta version actually updates more often than the release group. I use the beta so I get the updates sooner. It's been rock stable for me for YEARS.
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