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I Coded with WSL2 for a Week

I coded with Windows Subsystem for Linux for a week! And it’s actually pretty good.

This is a way to run a GNU/Linux environment directly on Windows, unmodified, without the overhead of a traditional virtual machine or dualboot setup. The command-line tools, utilities, and applications you’re used to, and without the stupid backslashes that for some reason Windows has yet to change.

The program I built to test it out – a code racing website to put your typing skills to the test, but more on that next video. Let’s talk WSL, the system I’ve been averse to ever since its initial release 6 years ago.

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👨‍💻 My Coding Gear:
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🔧Coding Tools:
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by ForrestKnight

linux web server

20 thoughts on “I Coded with WSL2 for a Week

  • WSL rocks, nothing a full-fledged install wouldn't do for me.

    Oh yea, and tons of apps are using WSL2 for their backend server:

    Docker
    Podman
    Openshift
    KIND.

  • I feel I can say this is the case for a lot of developers that the reason they're still stuck to Windows is because of games they're already into. (Genshin and Osu in my case). For people like us, WSL is an absolute win!
    One thing still bothers me is the absolutely slow install speed for VSCode extensions, or any library for the matter. Really hampers my experience.

  • I tried both, WSL 2 and Linux directly for development and experienced Linux is still far superior when it comes to performance.

    Developing on Windows without WSL is the slowest environment in my case.

  • Embrace. Extend. Extinguish. No thank you.

    Debian + Wine/Proton + Theia.

    :thumbsup:

  • I have heard of WSL before but never really used it much as I have an old computer with Linux that I normally do my programming on. However, I bought a new laptop with Windows 11 and I'm curious as to what is possible to do with WSL. Thanks for this video.

  • I am using WSL since it's included for the first time in Windows 10. I love it. I have done many complex projects to hobby projects it never disappointed me. After sometimes it just feels like it's a she'll in Windows OS it's so well integrated. WSL2 has enabled some UI features of the Ubuntu accessible in Windows that's even better.

  • This is basically what I've always wanted and I had no idea it was even there. A combination of many Wine-non-compatible games, me trying to learn many other things at once, and just wanting to be able to turn my brain off on my home PC led me to giving up on Linux after switching and getting used to the absolute basics of command line, even though there were many times where I said to myself "no wonder they shit on Windows when you can do this." Now I can get used to all the command line stuff at my own pace while still being a brain dead computer baby. Eventually I'll probably forego most common Windows GUI stuff, but ripping off the bandaid and going full GNU kernal is a lot more painful, even if you use something super friendly like Mint or Pop! like I was.

  • I get to used to coding on WSL2 by neovim, tmux, etc. That's awesome, don't even want to open my macbook.(playing games on Windows some times)

  • I like Windows, like Linux. It's all just tech to me. I find your thoughts encouraging. I'm playing with Haskell & the build tools play poorly with Windows. Did consider dual booting but I hate that, I tried VM'ing and then found myself despairing at having to fight screen resolution problems. So far so usual. I am hoping WSL is the solution, it sounds good, it's not the GUI I want after all, I want the programs executing within a linux environment.

  • WSL is great, and I use it every day but it is not as good as having a linux system. For instance, WSL is very slow sometimes when accessing the windows filesystem. I've had bugs where language features in vscode take ages to load, while on windows is fast. It's a lifesaver but it's far from being perfect.

  • There sits zero reason to deal with the Microsoft tax…just run your distribution of chose natively, and put Microsoft in the rear view mirror.

  • You don't even need to boot the Linux (Ubuntu or whatever) , and can run all Linux commands from CMD or PS. It runs it thru WSL but show or interact in CMD. Bye bye cygwin or Gnubash etc.

  • well.. for me using WSL just makes me wanna jump directly into arch linux

  • I tried WSL2. From the functionality p.o.v. it works and do it good. But the performance sucks. I consumes 50% of CPU just after the start, and slowly dying after the real work with IDE.

  • WSL makes 32GB of RAM feel like 3 GB RAM

  • I like the Linux part of Windows.
    What I dislike is the Windows part of Windows.

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