[Discuss] Windows Subsystem for Linux

[Rich Pieri]

One of the new features in Windows 10 1607 (aka Anniversary Update) is
the Windows Subsystem for Linux. It lets you run Linux binaries on Windows.

No, it's not a virtual machine.

No, it's not a container.

No, it's not a Linux kernel compiled as an executable (coLinux).

No, it's not an environment for compiling and running POSIX code on
Windows (Cygwin).

No, it's not an emulator.

It is similar to WINE. It's a set of libraries/tools/etc that translate
Linux system calls into Windows system calls on the fly. It runs real
64-bit Linux ELF (specifically Ubuntu 14.04.4 LTS as of this writing)
binaries pulled directly from Canonical's distribution mirrors:

ratinox at SKULD:~$ file /bin/bash
/bin/bash: ELF 64-bit LSB  executable, x86-64, version 1 (SYSV),
dynamically linked (uses shared libs), for GNU/Linux 2.6.24,
BuildID[sha1]=54967822da027467f21e65a1eac7576dec7dd821, stripped
ratinox at SKULD:~$ sha256sum /bin/bash
8c4d49445d0050884e0703571f187338b10c7836b08ed822cc5fc6cf15ac76b0  /bin/bash

I wonder if RMS is going to try to get the world to call it
"GNU/Windows". :)

-- 
Rich P.