Microsoft brings Linux GUI apps to Windows 10
Microsoft has begun allowing Windows 10 testers to access Linux applications using the Linux GUI.
The first preview of GUI support is available today for Windows Insiders subscribers.
- This allows developers to run GUI editors, tools, and applications to create and test Linux applications.
- This is a significant extension of the Windows subsystem of the Linux operating system, WSL, from Microsoft, after the company added a full Linux kernel to Windows 10 last year.
- WSL is a compatibility layer for running binary executables for Linux across Windows 10 and Windows Server 2019.
- And in May 2019, WSL 2 was announced, introducing important changes, such as the true Linux kernel, through a subset of Hyper-V features.
- Previously, it was possible to run Linux applications using GUIs inside Windows using a third-party X server.
- But official support from Microsoft means there's also GPU hardware acceleration for apps and tools to run smoothly.
- Audio and microphone support is also included, so Linux developers can easily test or run video players and communications applications.
- All of this is enabled without Windows users having to use the X11 redirect and without having to manually start the X server.
- Microsoft automatically starts the Linux distribution accompanying the system when you try to run the Linux GUI application, which includes Wayland, X Server, PulseAudio Server, and everything else required to get this work done in Windows.
- Once the application and WSL are finished, this special distribution also ends, and all of these components combine to make it easier to run Linux GUI applications alongside regular Windows applications.
- Microsoft is also testing a new economic model for the Windows Task Manager in this latest beta, which is an experimental feature that allows you to control processing resources within the Task Manager.
- This mode is designed to reduce applications' consumption of system resources, and it may be useful if you want to temporarily restrict an application.
- And if you are interested in testing Linux GUI applications via Windows 10 or this new task manager feature, you need to install the latest version of Windows 10 for Windows Insider Testers with build number 21364, bearing in mind that this version is designed for developers and not for devices that depend on them daily.