Windows sub-system Linux 101

unpublished draft

WSLDocker

Overview

Windows sub-system Linux (aka wsl) is a set of services that provide environment for installing many Linux distributions on top of windows. As of Windows 10 and above, WSL should be available at default and can be turn on or off with Windows Features.

Common installation

Enable windows feature first
Download and install wsl2 update
wsl --set-default-version 2
wsl --update

Useful to know

Installation#

Before install WSL2, make sure those features was on:

Containers
Hyper-V
Virtual Machine Platform
Windows Sub-system for Linux

Install and set default wsl to wsl2
WSL config
Create VHDX drive - optional
If we want to be able running background service within WSL, enable systemd. This is easy way.

Mounting attention

Virtual hard disk frive always get un-mount for every restart, shutdown, so create a auto-mount a VHD/VHDX file at Startup as workaround, tutorial here.

Goal command to setup: powershell.exe Mount-VHD -Path "C:\Users\[SpecificUser]\wslvhdx\swap.vhdx"

Approach by global style (.wslconfig) file, should be locate at `%USERPROFILE%` (for all distributions)

[wsl2]
memory=8GB # Limits VM 8 GB memory in WSL
processors=2 # Makes the WSL 2 VM use two virtual processors
swap=32GB # Limits VM 32 GB storage in WSL - optional
swapFile=%USERPROFILE%\AppData\wslvhdx\swap.vhdx # Specify the actual swap file location - optional

Some useful command#

On window environment#

Check list of installed wsl: wsl -l -v
Upate wsl kernel: wsl --update
Run a command to a specific Distribution: wsl -d <DistributionName> <command> | free -m - get to see current consuming resouces.
Stop a wsl: wsl --shutdown <DistributionName> | Stop all wsl: wsl --shutdown
Start a wsl: wsl -d <DistributionName>
Set default distro: wsl --set-default <DistributionName>
Delete a distro: wsl --unregister <DistributionName>
Restart LxssManager: Restart-Service LxssManager

On WSL environment#

Get current absolute path corresponding to Window: wslpath -w .

Move docker data to another volume#

Docker default saving image path windows: C:\Users\<userName>\AppData\Local\Docker\wsl\data
Change it via tutorial

wsl --export docker-desktop-data E:\docker-desktop\docker-desktop-data.tar
wsl --unregister docker-desktop-data
wsl --import docker-desktop-data E:\docker-desktop\data E:\docker-desktop\docker-desktop-data.tar --version 2

Docker specific#

WSL: normally locate at %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\Docker\wsl (to see where %USERPROFILE% store. use cd ~ command).
docker-desktop - The distro that actually ran all the container, distro folder
docker-desktop-data - The distro that would store docker image, data folder
Changing docker image location