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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

#851

Post by p_ing »

bayindirh wrote: post #838
FeloniousHam wrote: post #833

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The obvious answer: you can't. I work in constrained environment with an IT department that provides the hardware and (most of) the software I develop on. I agree with all the WSL cheering here, it integrates almost seamlessly. But you're asking the wrong question. It should be "why not use MacOS?" if you need a stable UI with UNIX underneath :).

That's another sound option, but as a person who doesn't like Homebrew and stuffing /usr/local with tons of things, a lightweight Linux VM becomes mandatory after some point on macOS, too. Other than that, macOS plus some tools (Fileduck, Forklift, Tower, Kaleidoscope to name a few), you can be 99% there.

Homebrew on arm64 installs to /opt/homebrew.

Re: The Windows Subsystem for Linux is now open source

#852

Post by pxc »

debugnik wrote: post #718
spartanatreyu wrote: post #633

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. Their GTX series cards all used proprietary blobs that required unmanageable device specific interfaces. Starting from the RTX series cards, they still have proprietary blobs but instead of having device specific interfaces, they all use a shared public interface which makes compatibility and performance much better. It's not across the board, but there are instances of gaming benchmarks showing more performance…

I'd trade half my GPU performance for the NVIDIA drivers not freezing my system on wake-up. The new half-open ones arguably made it worse, it consistently freezes now.

Then why are you using NVIDIA? The AMD open-source driver stack is very mature by now

Re: The Windows Subsystem for Linux is now open source

#853

Post by pjmlp »

dfox wrote: post #834
pjmlp wrote: post #755

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can tell that if POSIX subsystem in Windows NT was actually a good enough UNIX experience, I would never bothered with those Slackware 2.0 install disks. And the subsystems concept was quite common in micro-computers and mainframes space, Microsoft did not come up with the idea for Windows.

The original POSIX subsystem was just there so MS could say that it exists (and pass DoD requirements). It got actually somewhat usable with the 2k/XP version, slightly better in Vista (notably: the utilities installer had option to use bash a default shell) and IIRC with 7 MS even again mentioned existence of the thing in marketing (with some cool new name for the thing).

Indeed, and that is why if I wanted to do university work at home instead of fighting for a place at one DG/UX terminal at the campus, I had to find something else.

I am aware it got much better later on, but given the way it was introduced, the mess with third party integrations, as Microsoft always outsourced the development effort (MKS, Interix,..), it never got people to care about afterwards.

First impressions matter most.

Re: The Windows Subsystem for Linux is now open source

#855

Post by skydhash »

FeloniousHam wrote: post #833
reisse wrote: post #748

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why not just use Linux then? The whole point of Windows right now is having a kernel that a) does not shove GPL down the device manufacturer's throat and b) care about driver API stability so that drivers actually work without manufacturer or maintaner intervention every kernel upgrade.

The obvious answer: you can't. I work in constrained environment with an IT department that provides the hardware and (most of) the software I develop on. I agree with all the WSL cheering here, it integrates almost seamlessly. But you're asking the wrong question. It should be "why not use MacOS?" if you need a stable UI with UNIX underneath :).

Current macos is going the windows direction with some architecture choice (default uninstallable software, settings panel mess, meaningless updates,…)

Re: The Windows Subsystem for Linux is now open source

#856

Post by justusthane »

rcleveng wrote: post #739
hypercube33 wrote: post #647

Earlier quoted context omitted.

WSL 1 was supposed to be like "Windows on NT" where it emulated the Linux kernal to the NT one. they skipped a ton of features then dumped the whole thing for a containerized virtual machine thing for version 2. Wish the NT one worked out but I get it being complicated.

I know -- I was super excited to see WSL1 and wished it worked. NT when started was the OS/2 personality and back at that time was excited to see NT as the OS to end all OSes (by running them all as a personality). But WSL2 is freaking incredible, I'm super excited to see this and just wish the rest of windows would move to a Linux kernel and support bash natively everywhere. I was never a fan of powershell, sh/dash/…

> I was never a fan of powershell, sh/dash/ash/bash seem fine

It depends on what you're doing. PowerShell is incredible for Windows sysadmin, and the way it pipes objects between commands rather than text makes it really easy to compose pretty advanced operations.

However, if I'm doing text manipulation, wrangling logs, etc, then yes, absolutely I'm going to use a *nix scripting language.

Re: The Windows Subsystem for Linux is now open source

#857

Post by p_ing »

miroljub wrote: post #794
0xEF wrote: post #789

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Businesses would. The problem with that is you have decision makers in said businesses who don't know any better, so Microsoft-all-the-things gets pushed down the line. Offices are all trapped on Windows 10/11 and using Teams/Outlook with Exchange/Entra/Azure chugging along in all its misconfigured glory. Heck, half the MSPs I work side-by-side with seem to only offer support on Windows machines. It gets worse. When…

Yeah, I totally agree with what's being said here. It's a tough pill to swallow when you realize just how entrenched Microsoft is in the business world, and how difficult it would be to get everyone to make the switch to Linux. I mean, think about it - most companies are still stuck on Windows 10 or 11, and they're using all those Microsoft services like Teams, Outlook, and Exchange. It's like they're trapped in this…

They're "trapped" because there is no answer to the Exchange/Outlook combo for business purposes and it's very inexpensive for the value it provides. There are of course alternatives to Teams until you pair Teams with SharePoint/OneDrive/Copilot/Exchange/3rd party market.

> A lot of them are just kids who memorized some CompTIA exams and don't really know what they're doing.

Well, this is true throughout IT, even those who went to college for a CS or IT-based degrees. People want to make money, and IT has been a safe haven so far to do so.

Re: The Windows Subsystem for Linux is now open source

#858

Post by p_ing »

gloosx wrote: post #812
Peanuts99 wrote: post #790

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're underestimating how many businesses rely on Excel alone.

You're saying it like there is no alternative and you can't just open and edit same excel files in Libre Office Calc, Google Sheets or Numbers without any problem whatsoever.

Not only is it about lack of features on the open source side, it's about workflow.

Sure Photoshop and Gimp both edit pictures, but the workflow is so different that professional users of Photoshop aren't going to switch just because it's FOSS.

Re: The Windows Subsystem for Linux is now open source

#859

Post by pxc »

your_challenger wrote: post #683

WSL is a landmine of bad design. I lost all my data once, and that incident made me switch to a Mac. Here's how you can lose all your data - and Microsoft engineers won’t care: https://github.com/microsoft/WSL/issues/8992 https://github.com/microsoft/WSL/issues/9830 https://github.com/microsoft/WSL/issues/9049#issuecomment-26...

I've hit real data loss bugs in WSL, as well— files disappearing, sometimes even rendering the WSL guest unbootable.

Re: The Windows Subsystem for Linux is now open source

#860

Post by soygem »

nlawalker wrote: post #711
liendolucas wrote: post #107

I would do it the other way round: use Windows in a virtual machine from Linux. If you are in Windows and have the urge to use Linux, do the proper switch once and for all. You will never look back. I haven't in almost 15 years. Given what Windows has become and already discussed here on HN I would even hesitate to run it in a virtual machine. Edit: more than 15 years.

I feel like every conversation about this is the bell curve/midwit meme[1], with the middle being the argument over “Windows VM on Linux” and “Linux VM on windows”, and the edges being “own multiple computers”. [1] https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/iq-bell-curve-midwit

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