
Bash on Ubuntu on Windows - aymenim
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/commandline/2016/04/06/bash-on-ubuntu-on-windows-download-now-3/
======
siscia
I am a little scared from the distinction we are start to make between
"computers" and "developers' computers"

In most computer nowadays you cannot code (tables and smartphones), are
computers doomed to be an expensive tool for few "nerd" ? What will be the
impact on computer literacy ?

~~~
omaranto
What do you mean you "cannot" code on tablets and smartphones? There are nice
interpreters and compilers in the official app stores for major mobiles OS,
aren't there? I've used Python on iOS, Android and Windows Phone. Also J,
Ocaml, some dialects of Lisp, C# and Ruby, that I can remember now (each
language on at least one of those OSes, sometimes more than one). Not to
mention these devices all come with web browsers which means at the very least
you can use JavaScript (I've done at least one Project Euler question on an
iPod Touch in CoffeeScript standing in line at the bank.)

The tablet I currently own cost me $80 and came with a C# compiler
preinstalled! (Maybe that's an extreme example: It is a Windows tablet, and
Android or iOS only come with JavaScript JIT compilers preinstalled.)

~~~
lossolo
I tried to code on smartphone, never again. I am x times more productive on
desktop.

~~~
onion2k
I've recently started using Termux on my phone with a bluetooth keyboard - I'm
as productive as I would be doing dev over SSH. All the tools I'd use on a
server are there (node, git, nano, etc). I've written a small API server with
it and it wasn't a disaster. Admittedly I'm more productive when I'm on my
laptop with Atom and a couple of monitors, but if that isn't an option I can
still do work. It's a bonus rather than an alternative.

------
atgreen
As I understand it, Microsoft has copied the Linux kernel system call
interfaces and provided their own underlying implementation.

Given that Microsoft supported Oracle's view that the structure, sequence, and
organization of the Java programming interfaces were covered by copyright law,
then surely they would also agree that the same holds true for the Linux
kernel system call interfaces.

I don't like the APIs-are-copyrightable decision, but given that's the current
state, why aren't we talking about how this is a violation of the Linux kernel
copyright license -- the GPL?

~~~
jjuel
Do you really think a multi billion dollar company like Microsoft wouldn't
have their legal team all over this? Do you not think they would have
researched this out. Discussed their implementation, and made sure everything
they were doing was going to meet the GPL copyright standards?

~~~
osweiller
This same "multi billion dollar" company had an AI bot tweeting Nazi
propaganda a week ago. They spectacularly failed in their xbox one release,
having to completely retool and regroup. Their Windows Phone efforts remain a
complete disaster and are now doomed to failure.

The whole "they're a big company...don't you think they've thought of this!"
argument (and its many "do you really think they'll lose?" variations) is
_always_ a fallacy. That doesn't make the argument about the copyright of ABIs
valid, but at the same time the notion that Microsoft is big therefore they
must be right is absurd.

~~~
dubcanada
Well if we really believe the bot was AI, then it wasn't Microsoft's bot. It
was was it's own "artificial intelligence".

But the rest of those have nothing to do with their legal team. They wouldn't
implement a copy of another OS into this OS without making sure it was legal
to do so.

~~~
fizzbatter
I think the AI comment was more to the fact that, they didn't safeguard
against _seemingly_ obvious outcomes - such as internet trolls trying to get
the bot to say bad things. Many companies put no-go words during username
creation, hitler, racist words, etc - so why didn't Microsoft?

It might not have been simple to do, but still - hard not to see the outcome.

~~~
rmwaite
lol what the hell are you talking about. this thing is SUPPOSED to learn. you
can't have ai and restrict what it learns, it defeats the entire purpose.
isn't this the same thing that happens to people too? they go around the
internet and soak up knowledge, sometimes racist, harmful, misinformation, but
they soak it up nonetheless.

~~~
fizzbatter
Well, to be clear, i didn't say restrict what it learns - i said safeguard
against outcomes. Or, are you arguing that Microsoft knew the bot would slur
racist insults in a laughably short timeframe, and only planned to run the bot
for said timeframe?

The very fact that they had to pull the plug seems to suggest that it was not
desired, and as such, it should have been safe guarded against.

An example safeguard being, limit what it can say. If it has racist/etc stuff
in it, literally don't send to twitter. The bot still learns, the algos don't
change, and Microsoft still gets to see what the given AI will behave like in
full public. And above all else, the bot isn't a Microsoft branded Hail Hitler
AI.

It sounds like you believe what happened is perfectly within reason - if
that's the case, why do you believe they pulled the plug?

~~~
scrupulusalbion
Did they even have any sort of filter? If they at least blacklisted these
words [0], then that seems like a reasonable enough effort on its own.
However, these developers would have had to be living in a bubble to not know
about trolls from 4chan.

All in all, this is a lesson that some high-profile person/group eventually
had to learn on our behalf. Now, when an unknowing manager asks why your chat
bot needs to avoid certain offensive phrases because, "our clientele aren't a
bunch of racists", you can just point him to this story. The actual racists
are tame by comparison to what trolls will do to your software.

[0] = [https://github.com/shutterstock/List-of-Dirty-Naughty-
Obscen...](https://github.com/shutterstock/List-of-Dirty-Naughty-Obscene-and-
Otherwise-Bad-Words)

------
captainmuon
I have to say after the initial excitement, I'm a bit disappointed about how
this is implemented. Apparently, there is no or little interaction between the
Linux world and the Windows world in this system. I don't see the benefits
over running a classical Linux-as-a-process like coLinux, or something like
Cygwin or MinGW.

The option to run unmodified executables is nice if you have closed-source
linux binaries, but they are rare, and this is directed towards developers and
not deployment anyway (where this might be a useful feature).

When I heard "Linux subsystem", I was hoping for a fuller integration. Mapping
Linux users to Windows users, Linux processes to Windows processes etc.. I
want to do "top" in a cmd.exe window and see windows and linux processes. Or
for a more useful example, I want to use bash scripts to automate windows
tools, e.g. hairy VC++ builds. And I thought it would be possible to throw a
dlopen in a Linux program and load Windows DLLs. Since I don't need to run
unmodified Linux binaries, I don't see what this brings to me over cygwin.

I am hoping though that this might be a bit more stable (due to ubuntu
packages) and faster than Cygwin, and that it might push improvements of the
native Windows "console" window.

~~~
pjc50
Mapping the processes across implies all sorts of strange things - what
happens if you try to send a Linux signal to a Windows process?

Mapping the users is possible and "SFU" did this, with a couple of caveats
(Windows requires group and user names to be different, while UNIX systems
often have groups with the same name as users).

I don't think this is a Linux or GNOME killer, but it might put a dent in
Cygwin and git-bash.

~~~
SXX
Wine somehow solve that. Even if almost nobody use that Windows application
still able to use native APIs if it's detect that it's running in Wine. E.g
for example Windows Steam client checked Wine version long before native Steam
appear.

I think Microsoft can do something similar.

------
sz4kerto
I can confirm that you can run (at least some) GUI apps if you start an X
server on Windows (like Xming, etc.), and export DISPLAY.

~~~
rjtobin
Oh man, thanks for the tip! Works wonderfully. I just apt-get'ed synaptic and
it seems totally functional :) Xemacs and Angband don't work, but the fact
that so much works already bodes pretty well for the future.

~~~
Esau
Wait, someone still uses Xemacs? I think you're the first I've run across in a
long while.

------
dboreham
I wonder who came up with the "Bash on Windows" tagline. That was a really
smart idea. I think most of us would have run with "Emulated Linux syscall
layer from user mode processes on Windows". Promoting bash specifically seems
to me like engineering marketing genius -- less technically knowledgeable
people are more likely to be familiar with bash, while the more knowledgeable
are going to think "wait...what? how do they do that? that would mean...",
which works better than simply saying what they have done.

~~~
hellameta
Is this sarcasm? Bash on Windows definitely comes before "Emulated Linux
syscall layer from user mode processes on Windows" ... it's a great name,
sure, but marketing genius?

~~~
JdeBP
It's probably not a reference to
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11391931](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11391931)
, but see that anyway. Naming is up for discussion according to the
developers.

------
sveme
Smart move by Windows. I guess that developer usage of an OS ultimately
results in developer developments _for_ the OS, though I don't have any number
for this. It seems to me that a lot of developers, especially at startups,
have switched to OS X with its shiny GUI and UNIX compatibility. I'd hazard
the guess that this will ultimately result in OS X becoming more of a
developer target over time. Initially for developer-related stuff (see Dash as
an example that is only available for OS X (and Zeal for Linux)), but later
probably for other stuff as well.

What's illustrative for the dominance of *NIXes in development are the number
of projects on Github that contain only +NIX installation instructions and no
Windows instructions (again, anecdata).

So if Windows wants to remain competitive, they need to retain developers. And
as the +nix way of developing seems to be dominant now in quite a number of
fields, Microsoft needs to adapt.

Why, you're asking, do I think that the +NIX way of development is dominant
today? In a nutshell, Web -> Unix Servers -> POSIX shells -> Languages that
work best with POSIX -> OSs that are POSIX-compliant.

Edit: Asterisks don't work as expected here. At least not in a Markdown-
compatible way.

~~~
jayflux
Is it that smart? Being developer friendly sounds like just plain common-
sense, not some genius breakthrough. The question should be more why has it
taken them so long to get to this point.

~~~
sveme
Maybe. It is definitely the common-sense thing to do today, five years ago, it
would have been smart. From a pre-Nadella perspective, you could have called
it revolutionary, but now we're used to Microsoft participating in OSS, so
it's much less so.

~~~
pritambaral
Wasn't Ballmer's _" developers, developers, developers"_ chant more than five
years ago?

------
shultays
I'd just like to interject for a moment. What you’re referring to as Windows,
is in fact, GNU/Windows, or as I’ve recently taken to calling it, GNU plus
Windows.

~~~
zxcvcxz
I call it NSA/Windows.

~~~
coroutines
Windows 5 Eyes ?

------
bigiain
So 2016 is _finally_ the year of Linux on the Desktop?

~~~
chx
No, Linux on the Desktop has just died. I expect both the KDE and Gnome
projects dead within a (very few) years, probably X.org close behind.

All hail Winux though. (That's the name for this mix I came up with.)

Before you downvote this without thinking ... consider, for example, KDE is
severely understaffed and this will deplete them further. Who will bother with
X.org bugs and drivers now? What's the point? Who is your target audience? You
need to drink a real big dose of Stallman kool-aid to continue with Linux if
this thing on Windows works as promised.

I have been using Linux solely on my laptop since 2004. I am sick of the
constant driver problems. Yes, yes, you can connect to your home router or the
router in the cafe. Now go and try and connect to an enterprise network.
Perhaps with VPN.

~~~
cyphar
I do all of the things you mention without problem. I don't definitely don't
think GNU/Linux will die as a result. First off, syscall emulation will always
be clunky. Secondly, many people care about their freedom. Thirdly, what makes
you think that a majority of people using GNU/Linux will switch. I haven't had
driver or network problems for the past 3 years on any of my various machines.

~~~
chx
Congrats! What about this guy
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11445505](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11445505)
and what I typed up
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11413469](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11413469)
here.

~~~
cyphar
No need to be flippant. Yes, I read those comments and I don't share those
experiences. I've used my fair share of odd hardware and I've never had
problems that couldn't be resolved without half an hour if Googling.

------
ghshephard
I'll be interested in hearing from anyone who uses this and finds it offers
them more than they are currently getting from cygwin or VMware+Linux VM. I
realize it's a very different beast from cygwin - an entire User Mode Linux
environment, as opposed to being able to download windows versions of the
Linux Environment, but, on a day to day basis, It will be interesting to see
what people do differently, and why they would use WSL as opposed to just
running a Linux VM on their workstation if cygwin isn't sufficient.

~~~
sz4kerto
My potential use case: run the IDE on the host (Windows UI is fast, font
rendering is great), but use git, etc. from the Linux command line (to get
file permissions, etc. right).

~~~
tdicola
Install git (the real git from [https://git-scm.com/](https://git-scm.com/),
not a fancy GUI) and use the git bash shell today. It runs msys and has a full
set of Linux utilities like ls, etc.

~~~
zbjornson
The powershell extensions in Git Shell (not git bash) are also fantastic and
less clunky (doesn't feel like mingw). Comes bundled with github for Windows.

------
themckman
Can anyone comment to how nice or awful running some sort of Linux VM (maybe
under Hyper-V) and using Putty to SSH to it for development on Windows would
be? This work is promising, but doesn't appear "quite there", yet. I run OSX
now, but don't really ever develop directly on the machine and am mostly
SSH'ed to Linux hosts for development.

~~~
iaskwhy
It works amazingly well. Vagrant helps a lot setting everything up. I even
used several VM instances at the same time trying to mimic microservices
running in different servers. I edited all the files in my fave IDE running in
Windows, a file change would trigger an automatic server restart on the
affected service/VM. Debug worked just fine as did mobile debug using Vagrant
Share. It's my workflow for web stuff.

I sound like a Vagrant fanboy or shareholder but I'm just a very happy dev
since I started using this setup.

[https://www.vagrantup.com/](https://www.vagrantup.com/)

~~~
aruggirello
Yep. I've setup Vagrant for my development server environments, and I use the
vagrant-digitalocean plugin to deploy to DO. It's easy and convenient (though
my host system is also Ubuntu).

------
NamTaf
What a time to be alive! I'm holding out on upgrading to Win10 until I buy a
new PC since my 7 -> 10 upgrade ties to hardware, but I hope to have that done
by the end of next month. I can't wait to try this out.

edit: Specifically, I want to understand to what extent - if any - will it
allow some of the horror problems you have working with certain Python
libraries (compiling Numpy on Windows is like pulling teeth) to be a thing of
the past. I'd be more than happy to work in WinBash for Python if it means
having the easy Linux install processes available for some of the more
scientific packages.

~~~
tdicola
If anything it's going to make it worse. When you type python in a command
prompt which version is going to run, the windows version or the Ubuntu
version? Even worse when you pip install a package what pip are you running,
windows or Ubuntu?

Python on Windows is painful mostly because of the amount of binary packages
that have to be compiled since distributing binary packages hasn't been in
vogue until only recently with Python. You can save a ton of trouble using
something like Anaconda, or honestly just run a Linux VM. If you're compiling
numpy you're doing something wrong IMHO--use a prebuilt version that's
optimized for your processor (ideally using Intel's commercial compiler with
full SSE, etc. optimizations).

~~~
manigandham
Command prompt should run the windows version and bash should run the linux
version. Why would there be an issue here?

~~~
chx
Exactly. The Linux file system will have Windows mounted into it but I _think_
Windows won't be able to see the Linux filesystem. We will see.

~~~
sspiff
Linux and Windows can both see each others filesystem, but they are visible at
specific mount points in each environment.

You can't just use /home/chx/todo.txt as a path from any Windows application,
but you can find that file through some other path.

~~~
chx
Very interesting. What about case sensitivity?

~~~
SEMW
The underlying filesystem (NTFS) is case-sensitive, so I think it should
basically work fine. Sure, Windows tools are case-insensitive, so if you use
bash to create foo and Foo in the same directory you'll probably only be able
to access one of them from Windows Explorer, but I doubt that's much of a
problem for most people

------
BoysenberryPi
Maybe it's because I haven't been following this very closely but I'm
confused. Does this mean I can do things like compile Haskell or OCaml from
terminal as easily as I do on my Linux install? Can I use apt-get?

~~~
chx
Yes, that's the plan. This is a syscall translation layer. In theory
everything should run -- or most. I would not expect wireshark to run for
example but I have very high hopes for autossh for example because Scott
Hanselman have shown Redis running so higher level networking is there.

You might need
[http://www.straightrunning.com/XmingNotes/](http://www.straightrunning.com/XmingNotes/)
for GUI.

~~~
BoysenberryPi
This is really good news. I rushed through my new laptop purchase and forgot
to check the wireless card. Turns out the linux driver for my Realtek wifi
causes a soft CPU lock up so I've been stuck on Windows 10 and doing work in a
VM. Not nearly as fast and smooth.

------
bechampion
Man i do think this is a big step for windows , it's 2016 and still complex to
pull a du -sh or df on windows. Things we take for granted on *nixes. Much
love.

~~~
rat87
According to
[http://stackoverflow.com/a/868290/259130](http://stackoverflow.com/a/868290/259130)

    
    
        function directory-summary($dir=".") { 
          get-childitem $dir | 
            % { $f = $_ ; 
                get-childitem -r $_.FullName | 
                   measure-object -property length -sum | 
                     select @{Name="Name";Expression={$f}},Sum}
        }
    

I could get a shorter non exact version if I was on windows.

~~~
bechampion
that's almost as easy as just typing "du -sh"

~~~
MandieD
Add that function (or whatever combo of attributes you want to see on a
regular basis) to your PowerShell profile, as well as this line:

New-Alias -Name "du" -Value "Directory-Summary"

------
aurelien
GNU / Windows That is just GNU running on the Windows kernel. And not the
Linux kernel running in windows!

~~~
kyberias
No. This is a "Windows subsystem" [1] that implements a LINUX compatible ABI
for LINUX application binaries. GNU has nothing to do with it.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Architecture_of_Windows_NT](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Architecture_of_Windows_NT)

~~~
drdaeman
How come?

It's heavily marketed as "bash on Windows", and that "bash" is a GNU Bourne
Again Shell, a part of GNU Operating System, developed under GNU Project.

~~~
kyberias
This is not about Bash or any GNU software per se. Bash is just an example of
a Linux executable that can be run on this system. One can apt-get install
many more Ubuntu application binaries.

Please invest some time to understand what it's about technically.

~~~
drdaeman
I do understand that technically speaking, this is an implementation of Linux-
compatible APIs/ABIs on Windows, so an ELF binary targetting POSIX-compatible
environment could be ran on Windows. No dependencies on GNU OS parts here, of
course.

However, please notice that it's _also_ marketed as - quoting the article -
"the ability to run native Bash and GNU/Linux command-line tools [on Windows]"
and currently implemented as GNU-based OS (Ubuntu) running on Windows. So -
_in practice_ \- essentially, it's MS-supported (although hosted by Canonical)
GNU on Windows.

~~~
kyberias
> So - in practice - essentially, it's MS-supported (although hosted by
> Canonical) GNU on Windows.

I don't care how it's marketed.

Let me remind you that there have been numerous ports of GNU tools for the
Windows operating system in the past. This does not allow you to run any more
GNU tools on Windows than you previously had.

Therefore, essentially, this is not about "GNU on Windows". This is about
running "Ubuntu Linux software on Windows" including, of course, and in
addition to numerous other tools, the GNU tools.

Also, the original statement was: "That is just GNU running on the Windows
kernel." This is obviously not just that.

------
paradite
I honestly don't really see the point in this.

If you like Ubuntu/Linux more, then just install Ubuntu/Linux on the computer
without Windows. Why go through the additional layer of Windows?

Perhaps the use case is limited to people who need to run Windows/Mac-only
software like AutoCAD or some Adobe software.

~~~
skrause
I like the Unix command line, but I don't really like Desktop Linux anymore
(after having it used for >10 years), that's why I use OS X at home. At work
I'm required to use Windows because I develop Windows software, so it's
actually quite exciting that I get to use my most useful Unix utilities on my
work computer as well.

~~~
progman
> I don't really like Desktop Linux anymore

I used KDE 3 and Gnome 2 for many years (Windows also). and switched to
LXDE/OpenBox after KDE 4 and Gnome 3 turned out to be unusable.

Although my current desktop is very simple it has become one of my best
desktops ever because it can be configured to the extreme. It is very suitable
for developers who want a clean workspace which doesn't get in their way like
all the other modern desktops (Win 8+ also) which focus more on eye candy than
usability.

------
eulji
I do not get the hate. This is superb

~~~
creshal
Many (including me) feel that this is just the start of a new EEE cycle by a
panicked Microsoft, and will be killed off by Microsoft once they managed to
reverse their current downward trend – just like other supposedly
community-/interoperability friendly projects before, e.g. this project's
direct predecessor SFU.

~~~
eulji
And the problem with that is what ? You are afraid that you might like it. You
migrate and they will kill the project ?

If yes then...well...same can happen to any kind of software / project

~~~
morsch
No, that's not what embrace-extend-extinguish is about. The worry about EEE is
that they establish dominance through vertical integration, introduce
incompatibilities through both incompetence (bugs) and malicious behaviour
(features), which will weaken and destroy the free standard implementations.

I'm not worried though. This is a neat hack, and may be useful for some people
who for whatever personal reason won't switch to Linux proper, but it will not
gain anything like the dominance required to push through incompatibilities.
Unix applications already deal with a heterogenous environment, to say the
least, and Winux will just be one more participant; not a particularly
important one at that.

~~~
merpnderp
*nix servers now handle 99% of the web. Microsoft isn't going to push through breaking standards.

------
krisroadruck
Installed it to give it a go. It's impossible to install java on it. This is
makes it fairly useless for my purposes. _sigh_

~~~
JdeBP
What goes wrong when you try to install Java?

~~~
krisroadruck
if you go the apt-get route you get a sha256sum mismatch on both java7 &
java8. If you try to be clever and manually download it and throw it in the
cache, same story. If you try to be really really clever and manually download
it and try to manually extract the tar it throws a bunch of cannot create
symlink: invalid argument errors. I spent a good 2+ hours trying to force it
to install in various ways. For now at least it seems java is not meant to be
on Windows Bash.

~~~
JdeBP
For those interested in this, here's a more detailed report from someone named
Joachim Moeyens.

* [https://community.lsst.org/t/lsst-stack-on-ubuntu-linux-on-w...](https://community.lsst.org/t/lsst-stack-on-ubuntu-linux-on-windows/666)

Be aware that the Java8 installer/uninstaller has _other_ potential symbolic
link problems (not "invalid argument", though) that exist on actual Ubuntu
Linux.

* [http://askubuntu.com/questions/608961/](http://askubuntu.com/questions/608961/)

* [http://askubuntu.com/questions/653885/](http://askubuntu.com/questions/653885/)

------
woodman
Does anybody know if this interface is Linux kernel functions + whatever POSIX
is required to run Ubuntu stuff? I haven't seen that addressed, which strikes
me as strange because it could have some pretty serious implications. Am I
worrying over nothing, or could this make POSIX irrelevant pretty quickly as
the new portability standard becomes the Linux ABI. I've cheered on
Microsoft's recent moves in open source, but if they wanted to deal a serious
blow - rendering POSIX irrelevant would be pretty devastating.

~~~
cyphar
It's Linux syscall emulation. As for the death of POSIX, many unixes have had
the same (even superior) functionality for years. POSIX wasn't dead yesterday.
It isn't dead today

~~~
woodman
Thanks for the clarification. I wish I could be as unconcerned, but I remember
what IE did to web developers.

~~~
cyphar
Yeah, we got Firefox out of it. ;)

------
jordigh
Which bash version is it? Is MSFT actually shipping GPLv3 without killing
their entire company? Could it be that GPLv3 isn't a death blow to business?
Whatever happened to cancer?

~~~
xorblurb
They don't. Canonical ships the GPLv3 software.

------
mih
What about character sets? Do I still need to 'chcp 65001' from the DOS prompt
to type/cat utf-8 encoded text files before running bash?

------
johnchristopher
Why is it promoted with Ubuntu since it's basically - as put here
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11446420](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11446420)
\- the implementation of the `Linux kernel system call interfaces' ?

------
ruffrey
It's not on Ubuntu on Windows, right? It is Ubuntu bash on Windows via a
compatibility layer.

~~~
grimgrin
A graphical layer isn't present, but you can apt-get install anything that
runs in the background/command line. vim, emacs, etc. At least as far as I
know.

A commenter here mentioned having difficulties installing java, however:

> if you go the apt-get route you get a sha256sum mismatch on both java7 &
> java8. If you try to be clever and manually download it and throw it in the
> cache, same story. If you try to be really really clever and manually
> download it and try to manually extract the tar it throws a bunch of cannot
> create symlink: invalid argument errors. I spent a good 2+ hours trying to
> force it to install in various ways. For now at least it seems java is not
> meant to be on Windows Bash.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11446913](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11446913)

------
elcct
This is awesome! Can't wait to get my hands on it. If this works well, it is
like a dream come true. I never wanted to abandon Windows because of a lot of
music software that I am using. Now I will have the best of both worlds. Neat.

------
nailer
Just switched the the 'fast' ring and have installed all updates, but can't
see the new 'Windows Services for Linux' item in 'Features'. Anyone know how
to fix it?

------
spriggan3
This is great for cross-platform development Linux will benefit from this.

------
holografix
I've been using Docker for my dev environment (Python, Django, Postgres, etc).
I expose a folder with my code to the Docker container so I can keep editing
the code on Windows using Sublime. One thing that has been annoying me is the
fact that I can't get Python code completion on sublime because Python and the
packages are in the container. Does anyone know if it's possible to point
Sublime to the Linux subsystem and get code completion? Also, has anyone tried
installing Tensorflow yet?

~~~
baq
from previous posts it looks like the linux image is just a folder in your
AppData somewhere, so it should be trivial.

------
staticelf
They sure seem to deliver. Unfortunately I am not a windows insider. I will
probably wait until the anniversary update.

I guess this bash on ubuntu on windows won't be available for Windows 7?

~~~
justinlardinois
I think it was specifically announced as Windows 10 only.

------
Bedon292
I put this on my machine last night, and quite enjoyed playing around with it.
apt-get, python and everything I tried worked. Even vim works great, as long
as you don't mind 16 colors. The one thing I could not figure out was getting
256 colors out of Command Prompt.

Has anyone come up with a solution for that yet? I wonder if you can install
something like xterm, and get that running outside of Command Prompt...

------
Keyframe
I am still on Windows 8.1, so if anyone that tries it can confirm if this
works well with ConEmu and if Vim works well? Also, what the performance is
like compared to running stuff on full stack linux. Also, does one have access
to full hardware, like GPUs? That would be a good start. On Windows, my tool
of choice was/is Babun... but damn 32-bit cygwin and it tends to get real slow
(git especially so).

~~~
dduarte
It works fairly nice with ConEmu and other terminals. The performance is also
quite good: I installed clang and built a big-ish C++ project and it compiled
faster than using MSVC on Windows directly (10 vs 12 mins, roughly).

------
SXX
Sorry for off-topic, but have a legal question regarding Windows Insider. Is
it legal to install Insider build without activation and keep it running if it
stay in fast updates ring?

Currently updates postpone temporary license expiration, but I can't find an
answer how licensing work actually. I only run Windows in VM and I don't want
to mess my 8.1 system with genuine license.

------
poizan42
Unfortunately it seems that it won't install if you are running as a domain
user:
[https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CfZhLruXEAEp56x.jpg:large](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CfZhLruXEAEp56x.jpg:large)

It works if I try as a local user on the same machine. Also Windows Store
otherwise works fine for that domain user.

------
partiallypro
I have it installed, and I don't know how you are supposed to set up bash
profiles with this folder structure, or for instance if I need to move
something to my /bin/ folder to set up commands. I'm sure there is a way, but
it's not quite like base Ubuntu since it's using the Windows folder structure
and permissions.

------
giis
\- Does ls -li (show/emulate inode number ? I don't know whether NTFS has
inode number or not)

\- Find with exec , xargs is supported?

~~~
jagger27

        1125899906857921 -rwxrwxrwx 1 root root 21 Apr  7 07:56 test2.txt
        562949953436608 -rwxrwxrwx 1 root root 13 Apr  7 07:56 test.txt
    

Two files created seconds apart. Some sort of internal NTFS construct, maybe?

~~~
giis
Thanks for the output, it looks interesting. If these entries doesn't change
with next ls -li then yes,its the NTFS inode number in readable format.

------
MattBearman
I really want to try this on a VM in OSX, just so it could be "Bash on Ubuntu
on Windows on VirtualBox on OSX"

------
StreamBright
I am hoping there is going to be CentOS/RedHat available like this too. It
would be pretty awesome.

~~~
RobMurray
I'm sure you could just copy all the files from an existing system, then
delete the ubuntu files.

------
janus24
Sad that the VM (1) are no update to the #14316 version.

(1) [https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-
edge/tools/v...](https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-
edge/tools/vms/mac/)

~~~
dewiz
I don't think 14316 is sufficiently tested for that use case. Those VMs will
probably stick to the stable builds

------
ivthreadp110
Finally a reason to upgrade my office PC to Windows 10 (I run linux on my
personal machines)...

------
jsmith0295
There's a lot of comments related to the legality of this and whether or not
it violates either the GPL or at least the Linux trademark. Even if it wasn't
technically legal, I don't think the right parties have anything to gain by
suing.

------
annnnd
So, if I understand correctly, one can now run Docker containers "natively" on
Windows?

~~~
StreamBright
This is not the case. Depending on your definition of native you could run
Docker containers on Windows even before this.

[https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-
us/virtualization/windowsconta...](https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-
us/virtualization/windowscontainers/quick_start/manage_docker)

~~~
annnnd
No, that doesn't suit my definition of native. ;)

Too bad, that would really be a game changer for me. Running bash itself
though... yeah, ok, whatever. But maybe I'm not the target audience.

~~~
ZenoArrow
> "No, that doesn't suit my definition of native. ;)"

Why is that? Because the containers are running in Hyper-V? From a user
standpoint I doubt you'd notice any difference, especially once Hyper-V is
supported in Windows 10:

[https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/windowsserver/2016/04/04...](https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/windowsserver/2016/04/04/build-2016-container-
announcements-hyper-v-containers-and-windows-10-and-powershell-for-docker/)

~~~
annnnd
I would imagine resource consumption being much worse on Hyper-V because such
containers are basicaly VMs. Am I mistaken?

~~~
ZenoArrow
If you need fast storage resources you may notice a performance hit.
Performance for CPU and memory resources seems to be mostly the same as Docker
on Linux.

[https://caleblloyd.com/hardware/docker-performance-bare-
meta...](https://caleblloyd.com/hardware/docker-performance-bare-metal-vs-
virtual/)

------
doczoidberg
I switched to fast Ring on my two PCs yesterday. I don't get the update? Any
ideas why?

~~~
Sanddancer
It takes a bit for you to change rings. Give it a day or two.

------
koolba
Can anyone who's tried this out comment on the terminal?

Does it have all the same issues as gitbash/cygwin/mingw/winpty (garbling, bad
resizing, etc) or is there finally a decent local terminal on Windows?

~~~
contextfree
Windows 10 console (not just for Bash, but cmd/powershell too) added a bunch
of options like normal line wrap, highlighting and copy/paste that do improve
a lot. The annoying thing is that these options aren't the default (for
compatibility I guess?) and your settings in one don't seem to carry over to
other console windows, I feel like I've set them like six times now.

------
simula67
Will this be enabled by default ?

The ability to do 'curl some-site.com | bash' or ssh <hostname> 'curl some-
site.com | bash' without having to worry about platform compatibility would be
amazing.

~~~
creshal
Why would you ever want to do 'curl please-pwn-my-computer-so-hard | bash'?

~~~
izacus
Same reason you want to `brew please-pwn-my-computer-so-hard` or `apt-get
please-pwn-my-computer-so-hard` or `please-pwn-my-computer-so-hard.exe`.

There's little practical distinction between piping a shell script from a
random site or downloading a binary from it.

~~~
creshal
> or `apt-get please-pwn-my-computer-so-hard`

Installing a package manually vetted by distribution maintainers, _signed and
verified with GPG_ , is the same as blindly running a random script off the
internet?

I don't think you appreciate how much effort Linux distributions invested into
creating _safe_ ways of distributing software.

------
TorKlingberg
How much work is it to try this, starting from a normal Windows 10 install?

~~~
philjohn
A fair bit. You need to become a windows insider, if you aren't one already,
opt in to insider builds (which can take a couple of days) and then install
the insider preview.

Not worth it if you're just wanting to try it out, but if you want to test it
and feed back, then knock yourself out!

~~~
nikbackm
Yes, easier to just wait some time until the "Windows 10 Anniversary Update"
goes public for everyone.

Will surely be installed automatically like the November Update.

~~~
drewstiff
I have it on good authority that W10 Anniversary Update will go live for the
general public before the end of July if all goes to plan.

I think you will still then have to enable dev mode and install it as a
feature as per the OP link.

------
Starsgen
Can I run chron and schedule jobs?

I have Win 7, so I was thinking of running a VM with Win 10 to try it out
(once it is officially released).

It sounds like it runs X/Windows which is fantastic!

------
cmdrfred
Sometimes I feel like Microsoft is spying on me. I've used Windows since I've
used computers, a few months ago I 'upgraded' to 10. Sure it was slower and
unstable but I figured I'd give Microsoft some time to fix it and struggled
on. Then one day I come home and my lock screen is a ad. Right then I
downloaded Debian, made a usb drive and said goodbye to Microsoft on my
personal machines forever. I'll never look back. A week or two later they
announce this. Sorry Microsoft, after you get a taste of the power,
customization and flexibility of Linux you never go back.

------
jagermo
Can anyone say anything about the stability of build #14316?

~~~
dewiz
Coming from a previous build which was pretty good to do my daily job, I have
high expectations from this one.

------
heldrida
Why is it called Bash on Ubuntu on Windows ? What benefits does this bring in
comparison with running a Ubuntu VM for example ? Sounds interesting although.

~~~
JdeBP
The developers are interested in serious discussion of a better name.

* [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11391931](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11391931)

------
greenspot
Just went to Amazon looking for a Windows notebook

------
altano
Everything I try to apt-get is giving me the error "Could not resolve
'archive.ubuntu.com'"

------
gambiting
Can you do that on Windows 7? I could use this on work but our company hasn't
updated to Windows 10 yet.

~~~
Sanddancer
No, it's windows 10 only, and still in beta at that.

------
amgin3
I'm not seeing this windows feature in the options.. is it not available on
Windows 10 Home?

~~~
Sanddancer
Right now it's only on the insider builds, not everyone. Unless you are
getting beta/alpha builds, you're not going to see it for a wbile.

------
jedisct1
Doesn't work for me :(

The initial "bash" command freezes and doesn't download anything.

------
edwinyzh
No Windows 7 support, and I guess I will stick with Windows 7 in the near
future.

------
kyriakos
"bash on Ubuntu on Windows" am I the only one who finds the name weird?

~~~
TheLogothete
It is super weird. I think Ubuntu shell for Windows is much, much better.

~~~
progman
"Bash emulation in Ubuntu Layer on Windows" would probably be the accurate
version :-)

------
askvictor
Does this make installing Python binary packages (such as numpy) less hellish?

~~~
cmdrfred
I'm not sure but try Anaconda. 'conda install numpy' works for me, while pip
throws an exception.

------
solarized
And windows now more vulnerable. #bashViruses.

From: Alien

To: SomeWindowsBashUser

Attachment: naked.jpg

naked.jpg

\------------------------

#!/bin/bash

rm -rf /

\------------------------

------
ngrilly
Do symlinks, mmap and epoll work?

------
basicplus2
could this be the thin edge of a very large wedge?

------
simplemath
Look at me, im the Linux now.

-MSFT

------
groktor
Now we just need someone to make a nice laptop that can compete with the
MBP...

~~~
snklee
They already did: surface book.

~~~
Gigablah
I checked out the Surface Book briefly, and boy was it a massive
disappointment. The screen is much more heavier than the keyboard so it's
unbalanced, detaching and reattaching the screen is extremely awkward, and
there were touch issues with the stylus that the salesperson could not
resolve.

I'd rather hold out for the next iteration.

