- cross-posted to:
- linux@programming.dev
- linux@lemmy.ml
- cross-posted to:
- linux@programming.dev
- linux@lemmy.ml
Today we’re very excited to announce the open-source release of the Windows Subsystem for Linux. This is the result of a multiyear effort to prepare for this, and a great closure to the first ever issue raised on the Microsoft/WSL repo:
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So besides the brownie points, im curious what having it open sourced will benefit. Not like you can fork it to run on a different OS. You can make some extensions but to do what? You can’t really tie it further in to the host OS unless you know of some undocumented Win32 APIs.
Maybe im just not thinking creatively enough.
im curious what having it open sourced will benefit
MS won’t have to pay their own people to work on it anymore.
Not like you can fork it to run on a different OS.
For WSL1? yep that’s effectively impossible.
WSL2 is effectively just a wrapper around the kernel virtualization support and a bundling format, as long as whatever image you run talks to the host properly (like any other virtualised OS would) it’d run.
does that mean we could build a wsl that provides the flatpak environment, so that we could get a one click install flatpak for windows?
Should be possible, as it’s a normal VM you can already install flatpak apps in said VM as normal, you’d just need a Windows side bit to invoke the install within WSL when you opened the flatpak bundle, and then something to add a start menu shortcut from the app inside the VM (Which I actually assume already exists, I never actually ran WSL2 when I was on Windows)
WSL2 now supports WSLg which allows you to run X11 (or other graphics packages) natively now.
Watch someone reverse the thing into turbocharged WINE
The entire thing is for running Linux software on Windows, it’s the complete opposite of Wine.
The infrastructure can be duplicated and studied tho. Would be cool if a little dreamy
Sure, but not useful for wine or Linux
They released their code as MIT which is far more permissive than I was expecting. I was expecting some sort of proprietary license.
But they need to keep doing stuff like this. Devcontainers for VS Code is still proprietary and keeps me from running codium.
Now it’s our time to do some EEE
Fair play to Microsoft here. Hopefully we see some pull requests from non-ms employees and a better wsl experience for us all
but… you need to run it on microsoft, which isn’t open source…
Only right now. I’m sure someone will have it running on Wine or Proton by next week. Steamdeck subsystem for proton for Windows subsystem for linux
brb running vim on windows subsystem for linux on proton on wine on linux.
Just to confuse any computer virus.
Pretend I’m an idiot (should be easy), and tell me what this all is up in here.
Classic Microsoft Business Strategy
Embrace- Extend
- Extinguish
Means that now anyone can fork the project and make changes or iterate on it without needing to wait for Microsoft to fix things.
Fanks
Np! Also forgot to add, I haven’t checked the license but generally with proper open source projects (as in not just source available) it means that even if Microsoft tries to revert this at any point, having forks of this version and continuing to develop and distribute versions of it is A-OK
I still think it’s funny that the best way to run Linux on the desktop is via installing it through the Windows App Store
Oh you poor fool, if only you knew how good things could be…
Best?
not in the slightest.
Most convenient…maybe?
Let’s give them credit. Maybe their first experience was installing Gentoo, which is when Windows is better.
I am legit excited to install WINE Subsystem for Linux
Or how about KDE on ReactOS on WSL?
The possibilities are endless
ReactOS has SUCH potential. I really wanna see it thrive.
Unfortunately building it was a disaster a few years ago, I should give it another go.
Why were you trying to build it? You can find both ““stable”” release and nightly builds on ReactOS website.
ReactOS 0.4.16 was just released, but I do recommend just getting a nightly build, unless it doesn’t work and you have enough patience to try out the regular version as well.
To try and contribute! :P gotta start somewhere
Also try out winegui.
Thanks for nothing Microsoft
I don’t understand this.
Does this mean Windows programs and exe files will now run natively on linux?
Yes, as long as your Linux distro is Windows.
Yeah the naming is absurdly stupid. Its a linux subsystem that is part of windows nowadays. Its so people on windows can get access to a proper terminal interface.
Windows has a terminal interface already!
that thing is a glorified childs toy tho
Why do you say that
[Windows subsystem] for [executable environment] is the naming scheme. The default is Win32, there’s one for POSIX (practically never used), and Linux runs in another.
In my view it’s a Linux subsystem for Windows.
Why the name is the other way around, I’ll never understand.
Windows subsystem for (running) linux?
I guess the logic is that it’s a subsystem of Windows for the purpose of running Linux apps.
Agree though that it’s a confusing name. I remember thinking the same thing about Windows Subsystem for Android (the compatibility layer to run Android apps in Windows)
The original WSL doesn’t use the Linux kernel at all, it’s a Windows Subsystem for compatibility with Linux. WSL2 actually visualizes a complete Linux kernel, but the name stuck.
The original WSL DOES use the Linux kernel. Which runs as a native NT process (there’s a huge difference between NT and Win32 processes). But porting a Linux kernel into the NT binary is a maintenance nightmare, it’s much easier to run the original in a slim VM.
It’s a windows subsystem, and it runs linux.
I still will never understand why it’s not called Linux Subsystem for Windows.
I think it is because Windows has many subsystems, it’s just that you don’t hear about most of them aside from WSL.
So it is referring to the particular Windows Subsystem (of which there are many) that can run or emulate Linux.
Wait, Windows still has POSIX subsystem or is it only listed for documentation reasons (it was there at least in old NT days)?
There’s a trademark for Linux so Microsoft can’t name a product starting with Linux.
Still doesnt explain why it wasn’t called Windows Linux Subsystem (WLS)
So they can use Linux in the name, just not at the beginning? We’re so stupid. Can they do Windows Subsystem for Coke? Or Windows Subsystem for McDonald’s? Or Windows Subsystem for MacOs?
Good gravy.
Sorry, “gravy” is a registered trademark of Gravy, Inc.: https://trademarks.justia.com/854/89/gravy-85489026.html
I think this only applies to using the word “gravy” for payment services or a website referring to such a payment service. There was a prior trademark on the word for use with plush toy products.
Yes, there are a bunch of trademarks on the word “gravy”, in different industries. I was going to link to that one you mentioned, because for some reason despite being plush toy products, the company holding it was Bob Evans. But it’s since been canceled, and the company name doesn’t appear on the page, so I chose an active trademark instead.
Indeed, it’s why Apple could be trademarked as the name of an electronics company. But you can’t rock up to the trademark office and register “Pear” for a company selling pear-related products.
I mean I guess it makes some sense. Linux Subsystem for Windows to the uninitiated might sound like it “comes from the Linux brand”, whilst Windows Subsystem for Linux sounds more like its made by Windows.
Copyright is always stupid
This is trademark, not copyright
I think trademark law has a strange history in the US
I’m sure it does, I was just being facetious.
Disney presents Good Gravy®️
Good Gravy®️ Presentation for Disney
Not in the spirit of free software, if you ask me.
I got hung up on this before too but it’s apparently “Windows Subsystem for (using) Linux”
Maybe they just named it like the previous attempt: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Services_for_UNIX
I know there’s a lot of hate for Microsoft on Lemmy, but WSL is one of the best parts of Windows. It’s really powerful and well integrated to Windows. Since I still can’t leave for pure Linux install, I’m glad for WSL.
Microsoft hate is justified.
WSL is EEE
WSL made windows tolerable in the time I had to use a windows machine for work.
macOS is still the better choice for corp approved work, integrates decently with IT systems and is a “real” unix system underneath.
Linux on a corporate desktop is mostly about how well you know the IT guys and do they trust you. And of course the software stack.
Linux on a corporate desktop is mostly about how well you know the IT guys and do they trust you. And of course the software stack.
I would say it depends more on the commitment of the IT admins to support and manage a fleet of Linux workstations. There are Linux “Active Directory” servers, configuration provisioning tools, ways to centrally and automatically rollout updates, etc. It really depends on if the IT guys invest the same amount of effort to support them or not.
2000 people, 3k+ devices and one dude wants a Linux laptop.
Not happening 😀
But it did work in a smaller company of around 30 people, mostly because the IT guy was a Linux user too
IT just said no for WSL “ask your manager”
My manager barely knows how to read his email
and doesn’t understand why I want 3rd screen
Just buy a single 45" curved one then.
He doesn’t like that my cubicle computer would not be all the others
The only Windows PC I use is my work computer.
GPO blocked WSL.
I can’t even escape to a command line with the right flavour of slashes between directories. For eight hours a day, all hope is lost.
Only solution is to write your own
Funny that the Linux is best part of Windows lmao
Doubly ironic since Win32 is the only stable ABI on Linux.
How was it not open source before? Isn’t linux gpl?
You are confusing the software and Linux kernel that make up WSL2 because the former was proprietary until now and the latter has always been available on GitHub.
Kernel used in WSL2
What kind of axe do you need?
one of those pointy glass hammers should do it
for breaking windows
Ah, the Linux Subsystem for Windows (MSFT has never been great at naming things) is finally open source, hooray…
Now do it with rest of the operating system, and I may, possibly have a reason to care.
But it is not a “Linux Subsystem”, it is a “Windows Subsystem”.
If I write a hypothetical Driver for Linux to support windows, it would be a “Linux Module” not a “Windows Module”.
I guess they could have called it “Windows Subsystem for Linux support”
And is that subsystem for windows or for Linux?
Like…how do you find the zoom release for Linux? I thinks it’s very stable and now and very comparable to the version available for widows.
Windows, you mean? Please no, thanks, I don’t need to see anything of that garbage
Is this something to do with the three Es?
The 90s called, they want their joke back.
