Enable windows optional feature subsystem linux

Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) — подсистема ОС Windows 10, позволяющая разработчикам, тестировщикам запускать нативные приложения Linux, писать скрипты, выполнять команды непосредственно из Windows. В обновлённой Windows 10 (2004) появилась 2я версия WSL, в которой используется полноценное ядро Linux с возможностью запуска приложений и контейнеров Docker, реализована высокая скорость загрузки, небольшой объем потребляемых ресурсов, управление в фоновом режиме, обновление ядра. Таким образом вы сможете запускать ELF64 программы, которые могут получать доступ к файловой системе Windows без использования сторонних порто (таких как Cygwin).

Образ ядра Linux (версия ядра 4.19) в Windows 10 представляет собой легкую виртуальную машину, для запуска которой не нужно ставить полноценную роль Hyper-V. Системные вызовы Linux транслируются на лету в вызовы Windows без использования эмулятора (в отличии от WSL1).

Изначально компонент WSL отключен. Чтобы его включить, вам необходимо зайти в Пуск -> Панель управления -> Программы и компоненты -> Включение и отключение компонентов Windows (Control PanelAll Control Panel ItemsPrograms and FeaturesTurn Windows features on or off), активировать галочку Подсистема Windows для Linux (Windows Subsystem for Linux), нажать кнопку ОК, и перезагрузить компьютер.

Вы можете включить компоненты WSL в Windows 10 с помощью dism:

dism.exe /online /enable-feature /featurename:VirtualMachinePlatform /all /norestart
dism.exe /online /enable-feature /featurename:Microsoft-Windows-Subsystem-Linux /all /norestart

или PowerShell

Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName Microsoft-Windows-Subsystem-Linux
Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName VirtualMachinePlatform

После этого также необходимо перезагрузить компьютер.

В настройка BIOS/UEFI компьютера должна быть включена поддержка аппаратной виртуализации: Intel VT (Intel Virtualization Technology) или AMD-V.

Теперь вам нужно выполнить обновление WSL до версии 2. Для этого требуется зайти на сайт https://docs.microsoft.com/ru-ru/windows/wsl/wsl2-kernel, скачать файл wsl_update_x64.msi, установить его. По завершении увидите картинку

Чтобы сделать WSL2 архитектурой по умолчанию для новых дистрибутивов, в PowerShell выполните команду:

wsl --set-default-version 2

Далее вам необходимо открыть Microsoft Store, в поиске ввести слово “Linux”. В появившемся списке выберите нужный дистрибутив. Доступные Ubuntu, Debian, Kali Linux, Linux Cheatsheet, SUSE Linux Enterprise Server15, openSUSE Leap 15-1, Pengwin Enterprise, Fedora Remix for WSL или другие. В нашем примере мы будем использовать Ubuntu 20.04 LTS, нажмите кнопку Получить.

После установки можно проверить используемую версию WSL с помощью команды

wsl --list –-verbose

Если у вашей среды Linux указана версия 1, нужно изменить ее на WSL2 командой:

wsl --set-version Ubuntu-20.04 2

Файл жёсткого диска с образом виртуальной машины ОС Linux Ubuntu 20.04 будет располагаться в профиле пользователя: C:Users234AppDataLocalPackagesCanonicalGroupLimited.Ubuntu20.04onWindows_79rhkp1fndgscLocalState.

После установки дистрибутива в стартовом меню появляется ярлык на него. Для запуска Ubuntu зайдите в меню Пуск, нажмите на соответствующем ярлыке и получите в отдельном окне полноценную командную оболочку Bash. Запускать WSL можно и с помощью команды wsl. При первом запуске образа в командной строке Bash вам будет предложено создать пользователя и пароль (которые не должны совпадать с учётной записью Windows). Чтобы выполнять команды с правами root, необходимо использовать дополнительный ключ (префикс) sudo. В WSL есть общие команды для Bash и CMD, и тут нужно не забывать, что система Linux чувствительна к регистру.

Вы можете выполнить Linux-команды из CMD. Для этого необходимо вначале указать “WSL”. Например, для просмотра списка файлов и папок в каталоге Windows, выполните:

wsl
ls /mnt
ls/mnt/c

dir | wsl grep Sa
wsl ls ‑la > 123.txt
wsl ls ‑la /proc/cpuinfo
wsl ls ‑la “/mnt/c/Program Files”

Также вы можете открыть проводник командой explorer.exe, калькулятор – calc.exe, блокнот – notepad.exe, paint – mspaint.exe, календарь – cal, погоду – curl wttr.in

Ещё один пример взаимосвязи 2х систем – вы можете открыть в Windows файл из WSL-дистрибутива по сетевому пути. Для этого в CMD наберите путь к файлу:

notepad \wsl$Ubuntu-20.04home1122.txt

Из окна консоли вы можете обновить список пакетов в Ubuntu с помощью команд:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade

После обновления Ubuntu папка …/LocalState будет занимать 1.5 Гб.

Из командной строки Linux можно не только просмотреть Windows-файлы и каталоги, но и получить к ним доступ. Чтобы удобнее копировать файлы, просматривать директории и их содержимое, установите файловый менеджер Midnight Commander с помощью команды

sudo apt-get install mc

Вы можете запустить Midnight Commander как в командной оболочке Bash, так и внутри CMD. На скриншоте ниже показано, что в двух панелях MC показывается список файлов с обеих ОС.

Можно отобрахить сетевые настройки (IP адрес) IP-адрес Linux-системы:

ip addr | grep eth0

В WSL не предусмотрена работа приложений с графическим интерфейсом. Тем не менее вы можете попробовать их установить и использовать. Чтобы запускать графические приложения в Linux, нужно скачать и установить в Windows программу VcXsrv Windows X Server (https://sourceforge.net/projects/vcxsrv/).

С помощью пакетного менеджера apt-get установим несколько графических программ: например, браузер, текстовый редактор или что-то ещё:

sudo apt-get install gedit
sudo apt-get install firefox
sudo apt-get install x11-app

Затем создайте файл в директории root:

cd /~
vim .bash_login

впишите строку

export DISPLAY=$(cat /etc/resolv.conf | grep nameserver | awk '{print $2}'):0

сохраните запись

Esc -> :wr -> :q

Теперь можете запустить графические программы Linux через WSL командами:

firefox

или

gedit

Вы можете установить в Windows 10 несколько дистрибутивов Linux и запускать одновременно в разных окнах WSL. Вывести весь перечень установленных дистрибутивов можете с помощью команды:

wsl --list –all

чтобы завершить работу всех запущенных дистрибутивов и ядра WSL 2, выполните команду:

wsl --shutdown

WSL 2 or Windows Subsystem for Linux 2 is an iterative update to Windows Subsystem for Linux 1. Being so much better than WSL 1, it is obvious that one must upgrade to WSL 2. That is what we will be checking out in this guide.

The following are the requirements that your computer must fulfill for Windows Subsystem for Linux 2 to run properly:

• Windows 10 Build 18917 or newer
• Hyper-V Virtualization

To install Windows Subsystem for Linux 2 on Windows 11/10, follow these steps:

1. Enable the Optional feature.
2. Install a distro.
3. Enable Virtual Machine Platform optional feature.
4. Configure the installed distro.

1] Enable the Optional feature

In order to enable the WSL Optional feature, open Windows PowerShell with Administrator privileges.

Execute the following command:

Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName Microsoft-Windows-Subsystem-Linux

If will ask for a confirmation if you want to reboot your computer, hit Y to do it straight away or to reboot it manually, hit N.

2] Install a distro

You can try to download and install a suitable Linux distro for your computer from the Microsoft Store.

3] Enable Virtual Machine Platform optional feature

Open Windows PowerShell as an Administrator and execute the following command:

Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName VirtualMachinePlatform

If it asks for a confirmation, to reboot your computer, hit Y to do it straight away or to do it later, hit N.

4] Configure the installed distro

Finally, we have to configure the installed distro to WSL 2.

Open Windows PowerShell and execute this command to list all the available WSL distros on your computer:

wsl -l -v

Set the desired distro to WSL 2. execute the following command:

wsl --set-version DistroName 2

Finally, set the selected distro as default by executing the following command:

wsl --set-default-version 2

You would be experiencing the new seamless and faster experience with Windows Subsystem for Linux.

This new update to the command line utility brings in the new architecture. This will drastically improve the file system performance and the full system call compatibility. This new update is based on virtualization (which is based on Hyper – V) which works on a real Linux kernel.

How do I get WSL 2 on Windows 11/10?

To get WSL or Windows Subsystem for Linux 2 on Windows 11/10 computer, you must have Windows 10 Build 18917 or newer version, and Hyper-V virtualization enabled. Following that, you can follow the aforementioned steps one after one. You need to enable the Optional feature first. Then, you need to install a distribution, allow the Virtual Machine Platform optional feature, and configure the Linux distribution.

How do I get Linux subsystem on Windows 11/10?

To get Linux Subsystem on Windows 11/10, you need to use Windows PowerShell. Enter this command to enable the optional feature: Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName Microsoft-Windows-Subsystem-Linux. Then, download a Linux distribution from the Microsoft Store and turn on the Virtual Machine Platform optional feature using Windows PowerShell by entering this command: Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName VirtualMachinePlatform. Following that, you can configure the installation as you like.

You should be all set now!

TIP: You can install Windows Subsystem for Linux with a single command on Windows 11.

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Ever since Windows added the support for Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL), it has become easy for admins, developers, and power users to step into the world of Linux. Before WSL support was added, users had to rely on heavy virtualization tools (such as VirtualBox, VMware Workstation, and Hyper-V) or even dual-boot configurations to run a Linux instance.

In this article, I will cover the basics of Windows Subsystem for Linux, how to install it in Windows 11, and how to run an Ubuntu Linux container in WSL. You can also run any other version of Linux in WSL.

Introduction to Windows Subsystem for Linux

Windows Subsystem for Linux is an optional feature added to Windows 10 and later versions that allows users to run a Linux instance, including most command-line tools and applications, directly on Windows without using any traditional virtual machine or dual-boot configuration.

The WSL feature was originally added to Windows 10 version 1607 (Anniversary Update) and requires an x64-bit version of Windows. On Server operating systems, it is available for installation in Server 2016 version 1803.

The initial version of WSL (now known as WSL v1 or WSL 1) does not use the real Linux kernel. Instead, a translation layer between the Linux distribution and the Windows NT kernel translates and handles all the kernel-level operations.

A lot has changed since the initial launch of WSL. The newer version (known as WSL v2 or WSL 2) was released with Windows 10 version 1903, build 18362 (May 2019 Update); it included various architectural and performance improvements, particularly the use of the real Linux kernel. In WSL 2, in place of the translation layer, a real Linux kernel runs inside a lightweight utility virtual machine (VM), though this is not a traditional VM. This new architecture has resulted in a significant increase in file system performance and full system call compatibility.

Differences between WSL and traditional VM

While WSL 2 uses Microsoft’s Hyper-V as a hypervisor under the hood to run the utility VM, it does not require you to enable Windows’ Hyper-V role or feature; WSL works perfectly fine without it.

Please remember that WSL is not a full replacement for a traditional VM. Let me tell you why.

With the help of a hypervisor, a traditional VM creates an isolated environment in your host system that acts as a separate virtual computer with all the hardware components, such as CPU, RAM, and storage. This architecture allows a user to have a completely isolated system with a guest operating system.

However, this is not the case with WSL. While WSL 2 does run a real Linux kernel in a Hyper-V–based utility VM, it works completely behind the scenes; hence, the user does not need to install and manage the operating system or any other resources as with a traditional VM.

When to choose WSL 2

• You have a less powerful computer.
• You need a smaller memory or storage footprint.
• You need faster I/O performance.
• You don’t want to waste your time installing and managing the virtual machine.
• You need to run a Linux distribution (distro) for development and testing purposes.

When to choose a traditional VM

• You have a powerful computer for which resources (such as memory, CPU, and storage) are not a concern.
• You need to run an operating system other than GNU/Linux.
• You need a completely isolated and full-fledged system environment.
• You want to manage the operating system, applications, and resources.
• You want to run production-level workloads.
• You need advanced virtualization features, such as snapshots and load balancing.

In a nutshell, both WSL and traditional VM have several pros and cons; whether you want to run a Linux distro within WSL or within a traditional virtualization platform (such as VirtualBox, Hyper-V, or VMware Workstation) depends entirely on your interest and use case. I hope the aforementioned points will help you make an informed decision.

Prerequisites for WSL

Your system must have certain prerequisites before you can run WSL.

• It must have x64-bit and ARM64 processors.
• To run WSL 1 on an x64 system, it must be running at least Windows 10 version 1607 (Anniversary Update).
• To run WSL 2 on an x64 system, it must be running at least Windows 10 version 1903, build 18362 (May 2019 Update).
• To run WSL 2 on an ARM64 system, it must be running at least Windows 10 version 2004 (build 19041 or higher).

To check the operating system version and build number, you can type the winver command in the RUN dialog and press Enter.

Install WSL in Windows 11

If your system is running Windows 10 version 2004 (build 19041 or higher) or Windows 11, Microsoft has made it incredibly easy to install WSL 2. Just launch the PowerShell console with an elevated privilege and run the following command:

wsl --install

This command enables the optional Windows features required for WSL, downloads the latest Linux kernel, sets WSL 2 as the default, and installs the Ubuntu Linux distro for you.

Once the command is finished, you can restart your computer using the Restart-Computer -Force command.

After the restart, the WSL installation will resume automatically, and you will see an Ubuntu Linux terminal, which will ask you to set the username and password for the Ubuntu WSL instance.

Manually install Windows Subsystem for Linux

If you are running an older Windows 10 build or prefer installing WSL manually, you can follow the manual installation steps laid out below.

Launch the Windows PowerShell console with an elevated privilege and run the following command:

Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName 'Microsoft-Windows-Subsystem-Linux' -All -NoRestart

Many people still prefer using WSL 1. If you also want the same, you can restart your system at this stage and directly jump to Point 5 after rebooting. If you would rather use WSL 2, please continue to the next point. Make sure your system meets the prerequisites for running WSL 2.

The next step is to run the following command:

Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName 'VirtualMachinePlatform' -All -NoRestart

Now use the following command to restart your system:

Restart-Computer -Force

After the system has restarted, download the latest kernel package for your system using the following links and install the package:

• WSL 2 Linux kernel for x64 systems
• WSL 2 Linux kernel for ARM64 systems

Once the kernel package is installed, your system should be running WSL 1 by default. To change the default version to WSL 2, run the following command in an elevated PowerShell console:

wsl --set-default-version 2

Now you can install any Linux distro of your choice. We will cover that in the next section.

Install and manage Linux distros in WSL

Now that you have installed WSL in your system, you can run and manage your Linux distros using PowerShell. Launch the PowerShell console with an elevated privilege and use the commands mentioned in this section.

List the available Linux distros

To see the list of all the Linux distros available for installation with WSL in the online store, you can use the following command:

wsl --list --online

You can also use the short-version command wsl -l -o, which will yield a list of all the supported Linux distros available online for installation in your system.

If you’re thinking that this list is quite small and that you cannot see the distro of your choice, rest assured that there is a way you can import any Linux distro in WSL. But that is a manual method involving multiple steps. Hopefully, we’ll discuss that later.

Install a Linux distro

Once you have the list of available distros for your system, you can use the following command for installation:

wsl --install -d kali-linux

This command installs Kali Linux in WSL. Of course, you can replace kali-linux with the name of the distro you want to install. Once installed, Kali Linux will be launched in a terminal.

List installed Linux distros

To see the list of all the Linux distros installed in your system, you can use the following command:

wsl --list --verbose

You can also use the short-version command wsl -l -v, which will show a list of all the Linux distros installed in your system.

To list only the instances that are currently running, you can use the following command:

wsl --list --running

Change the default WSL Distro

Have you noticed a small asterisk (*) right next to the distro name when you run the wsl -l -v command? This asterisk represents the default distro for WSL. The wsl —status command also shows the current default distro. The default distro is the one that runs when you run wsl in a command line without specifying the —distribution (or -d) parameter.

For example, in my system, docker-desktop is set as the default distro. Changing the default distro to kali-linux can be done with the following command:

wsl --set-default kali-linux

Run and terminate Linux distros

To run any distro and connect to it, you can directly use the following command in PowerShell or the command prompt:

wsl --distribution kali-linux --user surender

Run and connect a WSL distro with a specific user.

After using the above command, you will be directly logged in to the Kali Linux bash shell. The good thing is that your Windows drives are automatically mounted under /mnt, so you can seamlessly transfer the files between Windows and the WSL instance.

To terminate (or stop) a WSL instance, you can use the following command:

wsl --terminate kali-linux

This command stops a particular Linux distro (Kali Linux in this case). If your system has multiple Linux distros that are running, you can use the following command to stop them all at once:

wsl --shutdown

This command immediately stops all the running Linux distros as well as the utility VM.

Change the WSL version

As mentioned earlier, WSL 1 runs by default after installation. To change the WSL version globally, you can use the following command:

wsl --set-default-version 2

This command changes the default WSL to WSL 2. If you want to use WSL 1, you can type 1 instead of 2 in the command. Setting the default version to WSL 2 means that every Linux distro you will install in this system will be running in WSL 2.

Apart from changing the WSL version globally, which will affect all future WSL instances, you can set the WSL version specifically for the selected Linux distro. To do this, use the following command:

wsl --set-version kali-linux 1

This command converts the Kali Linux distro to WSL 1. It could take a while for the conversion process to finish and for the change to be verified; you will see the VERSION column of the wsl -l -v command, as shown in the following image:

Please note that the WSL instance will be stopped during the version change process.

Remove a Linux distro

To remove or uninstall a Linux distro from WSL, you need to unregister the distro using the following command:

wsl --unregister ubuntu

This command unregisters a Linux distro (Ubuntu in this case). Please note that this command will permanently erase all the data, settings, and applications within that distro.

Mount a disk in WSL 2

A cool feature available in WSL 2 is the ability to mount disks that are not supported by Windows. Please note that this feature is available only in WSL 2 running on Windows 11 (build 22000 or higher). Furthermore, the Linux distro in which you plan to mount the disk should be running in WSL 2.

This feature is particularly useful when you want to access the contents of a disk formatted with a Linux file system that is not supported by Windows. To do this, you can mount the disk using the wsl —mount command and then access the contents using WSL.

A quick overview—Windows can recognize FAT, NTFS, ReFS, exFAT, and a few other file systems, but the EXT3 and EXT4 file systems are not supported. exFAT is a cross-platform file system that is equally supported on Windows, Linux, and MacOS.

For demonstration purposes, I just connected a virtual disk formatted with the EXT4 file system. As this disk is formatted in EXT4, Windows won’t recognize it, and nothing will show up in File Explorer.

To access its contents, we can mount this storage device and make it available for Linux distros. However, before mounting the disk, we need to get the device ID for the particular disk using the following PowerShell command:

Get-CimInstance -query 'SELECT * from Win32_DiskDrive'

Note down the device ID returned by the above command and use it to mount the disk using the following command:

wsl --mount <DeviceID>

This command mounts the specified disk and makes it available to all the Linux distros in WSL. You can use the —bare parameter to make the disk available in WSL without mounting it to all distros. The —type parameter can be used to specify the file system for the disk. If you don’t know the file system, you can skip this parameter.

The image below displays the commands I used:

After entering the bash terminal, I used the lsblkid command to list the partitions available on the disk. Once I obtained the partition’s name, I mounted the partition inside the /mnt/vdisk/ directory using the regular mount command. Following this, I could read the contents of the disk.

Once you finish accessing the contents and want to unmount the disk, you can use the following command:

wsl --unmount <DeviceID>

Update the WSL Linux kernel

By default, the WSL Linux kernel will be automatically updated with Windows updates. However, to manually check and update the kernel, you can use the following commands:

wsl --status

This command shows the status of WSL, including the default distro name, WSL version, and kernel version.

wsl --update

This command forcefully checks and updates the kernel version if an update is available.

File sharing between Windows and the WSL distro

As mentioned above, your Windows drives are automatically mounted under /mnt inside the Linux distro; hence, you can seamlessly transfer files between Windows and the WSL instance. To transfer files, you should navigate to the mounted drive and start accessing the files as you normally would in the Linux terminal.

If you would like to view the Linux files directly inside Windows File Explorer, you can use the following command in the bash terminal of the Linux distro:

explorer.exe .

Please make sure you don’t miss the period (.) at the end of the command.

This will open File Explorer in Windows directly inside your current working directory in the Linux distro.

This is extremely helpful if you’re a developer. You can use this trick to manage your projects and files in Windows as well as in Linux distros, taking advantage of Linux build tools that are not normally available in Windows.

And that’s the end of this guide.

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In the next article, we will discuss how you can export your favorite Linux distro and make it available in WSL 2, assuming the distro is not available for installation from the Microsoft online store by default.

What is WSL?

Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) allows users to run a Linux terminal environment, install packages from the Ubuntu archive, and run Linux applications and workflows on Windows 10.

What is WSL 1?

The original WSL is now known as WSL1. WSL1 is a compatibility layer for running Linux binary executables (ELF) natively on Windows 10. No re-compilation or ‘porting’ of applications is required. WSL1 provides a Linux-compatible kernel interface developed by Microsoft that allows a user to choose a Linux distribution to install from the Microsoft Store. WSL1 executes unmodified Linux ELF64 binaries by operating a Linux kernel interface on top of the Windows kernel in Windows 10. The WSL1 interface translates Linux system calls from the binaries into Windows system calls and then executes them at native speed. Linux applications run within the Linux distribution which provides the application’s dependencies and package management in a container-like environment. WSL provides an interface to mount drives within WSL.

What is WSL 2?

WSL2 was announced at Microsoft Build 2019. WSL2 features a Linux kernel running inside Windows 10 and is built on the core technology of Hyper-V to provide better Linux application support and improved file performance. Transitioning to WSL2 is seamless. To update to WSL 2 you need Windows 10 version 1903 or higher, with Build 18362 or higher.

• Announcing WSL2 — Microsoft blog announcing WSL2

• The new Windows subsystem for Linux architecture: a deep dive — WSL2 presentation at Microsoft Build 2019

• WSL2-Linux-Kernel — The source for the Linux kernel used in Windows Subsystem for Linux 2.

Enabling WSL in Windows 10

Before you can install Ubuntu on WSL, WSL has to be enabled in one of the following ways:

Using the GUI for enabling Windows features

1. Open the Start Menu and search Turn Windows features on or off

2. Select Windows Subsystem for Linux

3. Click OK

4. Restart your computer when prompted

Using PowerShell

1. Open PowerShell as Administrator and run:

      1  Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName Microsoft-Windows-Subsystem-Linux
   

2. Restart your computer when prompted

Additional Installation Resources

• WSL Installation Guide from Microsoft

• Windows Server Installation Guide from Microsoft

Ubuntu on WSL

Installing Ubuntu on WSL via the Microsoft Store (Recommended)

The recommended way to install Ubuntu on WSL is through the Microsoft Store.

The following Ubuntu releases are available as apps on the Microsoft Store:

• Ubuntu 16.04 LTS (Xenial) is the first release available for WSL. It supports the x64 architecture only. (offline installer: x64)

• Ubuntu 18.04 LTS (Bionic) is the second LTS release and the first one supporting ARM64 systems, too. (offline installers: x64, ARM64)

• Ubuntu 20.04 LTS (Focal) is the current LTS release, supporting both x64 and ARM64 architecture.

• Ubuntu (without the release version) always follows the recommended release, switching over to the next one when it gets the first point release. Right now it installs Ubuntu 20.04 LTS.

Each app creates a separate root file system in which Ubuntu shells are opened but app updates don’t change the root file system afterwards. Installing a different app in parallel creates a different root file system allowing you to have both Ubuntu LTS releases installed and running in case you need it for keeping compatibility with other external systems. You can also upgrade your Ubuntu 16.04 to 18.04 by running ‘do-release-upgrade’ and have three different systems running in parallel, separating production and sandboxes for experiments.

Installing Ubuntu on WSL via rootfs

Ubuntu WSL distribution rootfs daily builds are available for download:

• Ubuntu 16.04 LTS (Xenial)

• Ubuntu 18.04 LTS (Bionic)

• Ubuntu 19.10 (Eoan)

• Ubuntu 20.04 LTS (Focal)

They can be installed using the wsl command:

•    1  wsl --import <DistributionName> <InstallLocation> <FileName>
  

Installing Ubuntu on WSL by sideloading the .appx

Ubuntu WSL distribution .appx builds are available for download:

• Ubuntu 20.04 LTS (Focal)

• Ubuntu 20.04 LTS arm64

• Ubuntu 18.04 LTS (Bionic)

• Ubuntu 18.04 LTS arm64

• Ubuntu 16.04 LTS (Xenial)

They can be installed by enabling sideloading in Windows 10 and double-clicking the .appx and clicking Install or with PowerShell:

   1 Add-AppxPackage .CanonicalGroupLimited.Ubuntu18.04onWindows_1804.2018.817.0_x64__79rhkp1fndgsc.Appx

Running Ubuntu on WSL

Starting Ubuntu on WSL

The Ubuntu on WSL terminal can be started via:

• The app tile in the Windows Start menu (or pinned to your taskbar)

• WSL — Remote extension for Visual Studio Code.

• The wsl command on the Windows command prompt or PowerShell

• By running ubuntu1804.exe, etc. on the Windows command prompt or PowerShell

Installing Packages on Ubuntu

Package management on Ubuntu on WSL works the same as on desktop Ubuntu, using the apt package manager. apt will download and install packages from the Ubuntu archive.

First we check for updates:

We use sudo because installing packages is an administrator task and requires elevated privileges. Enter the UNIX password you created when you installed Ubuntu on WSL. This will not be your Windows password.

Next we can install a package:

For more information on managing packages with apt, see the following additional resources:

• apt — Official Ubuntu documentation

• InstallingSoftware

Keeping Ubuntu Updated in WSL

WSL runs its own specialized init system instead of SystemD and does not run standard Ubuntu services. Due to the services not running software updates are not applied automatically. Please keep your WSL installation using APT maintenance commands regularly. This can be accomplished with an occasional:

   1 sudo apt update
   2 sudo apt upgrade -y

Hello World

Lets write and compile a very simple Linux application on WSL. It will announce ‘Hello World!’ and then count to 10.

First, we will update apt and then install the necessary tools, often called dependencies:

   1 sudo apt update
   2 sudo apt install nim

Next, we will create and open a file named helloworld.nim:

Copy and paste the following code snippet (click ‘Toggle Line Numbers’ to hide line numbers). You can paste into the Ubuntu on WSL terminal by right-clicking with the mouse or Shift+Ctrl+’V’:

   1 echo "Hello World!"
   2 for i in countup(1, 10):
   3   echo i

Exit nano with Control+’X’ then press ‘Y’ and Enter.

Next we will compile our application back at our shell prompt:

   1 nim compile helloworld.nim

This compiles our Nim code snippet to C and then into a Linux binary named helloworld.

Then we can run our Linux binary:

You should see:

   1 Hello World
   2 1
   3 2
   4 3
   5 4
   6 5
   7 6
   8 7
   9 8
  10 9
  11 10

But we are not just on Linux, we are on WSL.

We can build and test on both Linux and Windows at the same time, including compiling our Hello World application for Windows.

To do this we need to add a dependency, mingw-w64:

   1 sudo apt install mingw-w64

Let’s compile our application again, this time creating a Windows binary:

   1 nim compile --gcc.exe:x86_64-w64-mingw32-gcc --gcc.linkerexe:x86_64-w64-mingw32-gcc --cpu:amd64 --os:windows --out:helloworld.exe helloworld.nim

Then move our binary to Windows and run it from within WSL (your path by vary based on your Windows username):

   1 mv helloworld.exe /mnt/c/Users/Hayden/OneDrive/Desktop/
   2 cmd.exe /c "C:UsersHaydenOneDriveDesktophelloworld.exe"

Learn more about Nim.

Advanced Topics

Performance

Ubuntu’s performance in WSL1 can be close to bare metal Ubuntu installations in mostly CPU-intensive tasks but file operations are much slower in WSL (see tests on Windows 10 April 2018 Update and on Windows builds from 2019). In WSL 2, CPU intensive tasks are measured to be slightly slower and file operations are generally faster than on WSL1.

Intra-WSL filesystem I/O will always be faster than WSL<->Windows filesystem I/O. It is recommended to move large files and git repos over to WSL to work with them on WSL. To improve performance of the file operations some sites suggest disabling anti-virus software. This puts your system at risk and we highly recommend against doing so.

Running Graphical Applications

The X Window System Architecture allows running the X server and the X clients on separate systems and in WSL’s case the X server can be a native Windows server providing even OpenGL acceleration and the clients can be the graphical Linux applications running in the WSL environment.

Install one from several X servers available for Windows and start it before entering the WSL environment:

• X410

• VcXsrv

• MobaXTerm

• Cygwin/C

If graphical applications can’t connect to the running X server automatically paste the following commands to the terminal before starting the applications or set them on every login by adding them to ~/.bashrc:

•    1  export DISPLAY=:0 
     2  export DISPLAY=$(awk '/nameserver / {print $2; exit}' /etc/resolv.conf 2>/dev/null):0 
     3  export LIBGL_ALWAYS_INDIRECT=1
  

Alternatively one can start the XServer (e.g., vcxsrv.exe using a saved config.xlaunch) and start a XWindows session from a Windows DOS batch file. Using this method, one can use DOS ipconfig to determine the virtual ethernet WSL2 IP and set the DISPLAY environment variable before starting the session. This is useful because the virtual ethernet IP will CHANGE with each Windows reboot (thus the need for the use of awk in the export DISPLAY above). Name the batch file whatever seems best for the purpose (note comments in this batch file code) and execute from same directory where the config.xlaunch file is (in this script c:bin):

•    1 @echo off
     2 
     3 rem Works ONLY if Ethernet adapter vEthernet (WSL): is the LAST "adapter" in
     4 rem the ipconfig output; that is, this for loop assigns the IPs from first to
     5 rem last from the ipconfig printed output, so the WSL virtual adapter must be the 
     6 rem last one in the ipconfig output for this to work correctly.
     7 rem If you have excellent DOS batch file skills, you may find a better
     8 rem way of doing this.
     9 
    10 for /f "tokens=1-2 delims=:" %%a in ('ipconfig^|find "IPv4"') do set ip==%%b
    11 set ipAddress=%ip:~1%
    12 
    13 rem Trim whitespace
    14 
    15 call :TRIM %ipAddress% ipAddress
    16 
    17 rem Use this for testing
    18 
    19 rem echo IP Address: %ipAddress%
    20 
    21 rem Start up the xServer using saved xlaunch configuration
    22 rem This configuration creates a single large window
    23 
    24 start /B config_one_window.xlaunch
    25 
    26 rem Start up PulseAudio server, will accept audio from external
    27 rem source, i.e., from the X server 
    28 
    29 start "" /B "C:binpulseaudio-5.0-rev18pulsepulseaudio.exe"
    30 
    31 rem Call ubuntu.exe, have it run what is essentially a startup 
    32 rem script that sets two ENV variables using the ipAddress variable
    33 rem created above, which is the virtual IP to which services
    34 rem INSIDE the running X server can connect; these are the
    35 rem link between WSL2 and Windows 10
    36 rem Initiate an xfce4 session with dbus-launch
    37 rem when the X server is killed, do cleanup by 
    38 rem killing pulseadio and vcxsrv
    39 
    40 <PATH_TO_UBUNTU_EXE>ubuntu.exe run "export DISPLAY="%ipAddress%:0.0"; export PULSE_SERVER="%ipAddress%"; if [ -z "$(pidof xfce4-session)" ]; then  dbus-launch --exit-with-session ~/.xsession; pkill '(gpg|ssh)-agent'; taskkill.exe /IM pulseaudio.exe /F; taskkill.exe /IM vcxsrv.exe; fi;"
    41 
    42 rem Function to trim white space or the export VARIABLE will fail
    43 
    44 :TRIM
    45 SET %2=%1
    46 GOTO :EOF
  

Enabling Sound

The WSL environment does not support audio, but it can be enabled by installing the PulseAudio server on Windows following this guide. With the latest wslu package installed the starting Ubuntu app detects the running PulseAudio server and enables audio.

Getting Help

Common Issues

• ‘WSL 2 requires an update to its kernel component.’ Solution

• Error codes, e.g. ‘Error: 0x80070002’ Solution

Reporting Windows Subsystem for Linux-specific Issues

Please report general WSL issues on GitHub.

Reporting Issues in Ubuntu

Please use the standard Ubuntu channels described in ReportingBugs.

Reporting Issues in the Ubuntu WSL Apps

Please report issues related to WSL-specific features in Ubuntu on WSL here.

Additional Resources

• Official Microsoft Documentation for WSL

• wsl.exe command line reference

• Awesome-WSL

• ##windows-wsl on Freenode