I still will never understand why it's not called Linux Subsystem for Windows.
There's a trademark for Linux so Microsoft can't name a product starting with Linux.
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.
I think trademark law has a strange history in the US
I'm sure it does, I was just being facetious.
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.
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.
Still doesnt explain why it wasn't called Windows Linux Subsystem (WLS)
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.
Maybe they just named it like the previous attempt: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Services_for_UNIX
Don't you think this is another Embrace, Extend, and Extinguish strategy from Microsoft?
That's exactly what it is. Any time now you'll see "the best way to run Linux: on windows" or similar.
I think it's an attempt to keep people on their platform who need easy access to a unix-like shell. Linux has it and so does mac os. Windows didn't until they introduced wsl.
Well windows had cygwin and mingw
I had to move back to those a few times instead of using WSL during the early days. There were quite a few growing pains.
Fixed it fully by installing Linux.
I think it’s more embrace. They have to compete against so many more entities now.
This is my thought, they've all but lost the battle for cloud servers and they'd rather the developers computers were Windows. WSL allows that.
I don't think that, as Microsoft hasn't done a lot (any?) of that stuff in recent years. It's good to be cautious but really what is the problem with opening the source for something that already existed for a while and is embraced by many?
Normally I would say yes, but WSL is so incredibly necessary for a developer that it might be legit.
It's kind of the opposite in my mind, WSL is (was) Microsoft capitulating to the fact that Linux is not going away, same with Azure. WSL is mostly for companies. Some companies have a huge contract with Microsoft and manage all laptops with it. Then they grow big enough that they can't ignore Linux because they have people who need to work on Linux. WSL is the way Microsoft keeps their clients, because otherwise they move to Apple based IT.
EEE would have been investing in PowerShell, PuTTY, or similar.
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.
Funny that the Linux is best part of Windows lmao
Microsoft hate is justified.
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.
WSL is EEE
Fair play to Microsoft here. Hopefully we see some pull requests from non-ms employees and a better wsl experience for us all
Great! With this source code out, I can finally complete the port to Linux. I call it WSL24L, aka "Windows Subsystem For Linux 2, For Linux"
This is for WSL2, not for WSL1. WSL2 is just a VM, not a big deal it it's open-sourced. WSL1 is superior to WSL2 in every way. BTW, WSL2 is not a continuation of WSL1, they are being developed in parallel. I still try to use WSL1 whenever possible. For Linux specific features, like systemd dependancy and mounting file systems, I'd use full-featured VM instead of WSL2.
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.
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.
I am legit excited to install WINE Subsystem for Linux
Or how about KDE on ReactOS on WSL?
The possibilities are endless
fuck microsoft and windows so hard. had to reinstall that shitshow on my mothers computer because a driver update fucked the whole networkstack... they throw error codes and what not but give no help whatsoever. the conclusion of everyone for every problem is to reinstall windows.... shitshow of an os, keep your dirty hands of linux!! can't wait to nuke it and install linux there and have no windows machine left
Making WSL open source could actually lead to some useful contributions and better transparency overall ; and good for Linux tools?
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.
Is this something to do with the three Es?
Thanks for nothing Microsoft
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