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Porting Debian to... Windows

Posted by michael on from the not-making-this-up dept.

mike_sucks writes: "The first step to porting Debian to the Win32 platform has been made - dpkg is compiling under Cygwin. Check out the post on debian-devel and the Debian GNU/w32 port's site." Some of the posters on the debian-devel list aren't too pleased with the idea.

15 of 416 comments (clear)

  1. Will this attract new users? by xdangavinx · · Score: 1, Interesting

    If Debian is successfully ported to Windows(tm) to the point where a non-computer savy users could set it up, does anyone think this would bring about a new batch of Linux users?

    1. Re:Will this attract new users? by zangdesign · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Why would it attract new users? Use of the command line is not a normal action for the majority of Windows users. Most, if not all, system utilities work through a gui that is, in normal use, stable and well-defined.

      I don't see any reason not to do this, but I also don't see any reason to do it. Having had cygwin installed on two boxes for the past six months, I find it to be more useless than a five-assed monkey and porting more stuff to it will not add any measure of usefulness.

      That being said, I think I found only one person on the mailing list didn't think it was a good idea. Most of them seemed more worried about whether or not RMS would approve variable names or something. This is apparently "one of those Linux things".

      Maybe they should port that stuff to Win32. If nothing else, he might get really apoplectic and have to be straitjacketed.

      --
      To celebrate the occasion of my 1000th post, I will post no more forever on Slashdot. Goodbye.
    2. Re:Will this attract new users? by ncc74656 · · Score: 3, Interesting
      Having had cygwin installed on two boxes for the past six months, I find it to be more useless than a five-assed monkey and porting more stuff to it will not add any measure of usefulness.
      That's odd...I've found sox and id3ed more useful than any equivalent native Win32 apps, and bash does more than cmd.exe (more powerful scripting, longer command lines for controlling stuff like vcdimager, etc.). OpenSSH under Cygwin is also useful for tunnelling through firewalls so you can use VNC to control Win32 boxen on remote networks...it works better here than pcAnywhere.
      --
      20 January 2017: the End of an Error.
  2. What a bunch of whiners by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Interesting

    Jesus, will those guys just suck it up? If someone feels that this project is worth their time, quit complaining and let them do it! If it's cool and useful, people will use and enjoy it! If it's not, it'll be a lesson for the author. (If they even care if anyone uses it... They might just be doing it for fun)

  3. I don't get it by beth_linker · · Score: 2, Interesting

    What's the point of the project? Are they porting specific tools that aren't already available with Cygwin, or are they reinventing the wheel? If I've got Cygwin running on my Win2K box, what extra benefits do I get from using Debian?

  4. Yes please by Mwongozi · · Score: 3, Interesting
    If they're doing what I think they're doing, this would be a very nice thing.

    One of the great advantages of the *nix platform that Windows has never really been able to match has been it's remote access capabilities.

    I run Windows on my desktop at home, but I also run a Debian GNU/Linux server, for the sole reason so that when I'm away from home, I can telnet into it and read my mail, use IRC, etc.

    I even have a Nokia 9210, and using it I can telnet to my Debian box and then use IRC from anywhere in Europe, Asia, or indeed anywhere with a GSM 900/1800 signal. (Basically, anywhere except USA. Suck. :)

    Being able to do "apt-get install telnetd irc" on a Windows box would be very nice indeed!

  5. Sometimes the OS doesn't matter by bill_mcgonigle · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The folks here who *have* to run windows, don't really, they *have* to run certain windows apps, because they are a defacto standard in the relevant application domain and the linux apps aren't quite up to par yet and WINE isn't quite ready for that app.

    They'll never willingly quit Windows cold-turkey, but if they can start to run debian/gnu/linux (pick one) apps on Windows, eventually the linux apps will overtake the quality of the windows apps and the people will then be using them and have no reason not to switch (cost, cost, cost).

    I used to think that linux on the desktop wasn't a goal worth persuing at the moment - then I realized every Windows/Office purchase is money for Microsoft to use on its quest to eliminate linux.

    --
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    OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
  6. "Debian" or "Linux"? by jbeamon · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I feel this has been done. There's already a bash-for-windows and a ksh-for-windows, both of which come with a number of common Unix tools. There's vmware itself. It strikes me that a lot of "Debian tools" are simply GNU tools, freeware, open source software, and Linux ports of historical Unix tools. I visited the sourceforge "homepage" for this, and it was a few paragraphs about getting windows users accustomed to using "Debian tools". I did not get the feeling this was anything new or unique, or that it was Debian-specific, except for maybe the apt-get system. That's about it. Am I missing something?

    --
    -j

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    -j
  7. I don't think this is good.. by acomj · · Score: 3, Interesting

    By giving Windows developers access to the great development tools of Linux/Unix (Cygwin et all..) I think you make it easier to have developers stick with windows than switch.

    I worked at a small software house that had a linux "mainframe" . Developers machines were dual boot Linux/NT. The NT had a Xserver and once Cygwin was installed on the NT side almost noonne booted into linux ever..WinCVS and SAMBA, TCL for windows, emacs, perl and Java, X made it super easy to do development on NT as opposed to using those tools in the native linux world. once compenets were build they could be loaded onto the linux machine and tested.

    I think it may make some more open to using linux, but not as many as those who stick it out with windows longer because the tools are almost the same now.

  8. The GNU meme must flow... by noser · · Score: 3, Interesting

    My first exposure to the GNU project was through programs like GNU chess ported to Windows, and the djgpp C compiler for DOS. I think that as people are given the opportunity to see that GNU software solves their problems, they will become more interested, leading to more interest in Linux and GNU software in general. This could be a great way for more of the public to "stick their toes in the water".

  9. The OS Hardly Ever Matters.... by Carnage4Life · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Except for some people who think choosing an operating system of importance equivalent to choosing a religion most of us don't care what OS we use. Instead most people care about what apps they can run on a given OS. My favorite apps/tools are Emacs, Perl, Internet Explorer, WinAmp, ICQ, ssh, bash, grep and Word. Windows runs all of them with the least amount of hassle and that's why I use it. This is true for most of the computer users in the world, the OS that the app happens to run on is incidental.

    I used to think that linux on the desktop wasn't a goal worth persuing at the moment - then I realized every Windows/Office purchase is money for Microsoft to use on its quest to eliminate linux.

    Short of acquiring a genie and using their three wishes to wish away Linux, Open Source, and college classes on operating systems there's no way that anyone can eliminate Linux. Most reasonable people realize this (including Linus) and rightfully don't see Linux vs. Microsoft as some sort of war that should be won at all costs.

  10. Speaking as a user with no Linux experience... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    ...you Linux proponents should be *ecstatic* over this! Seriously! I want to mess around with Linux and such, but I'm not going to go through the hassle of dual booting- but seeing something like this- I'm like hmmm, well maybe I'll give it a shot, so...

    ...next thing you know I might just be using various Linux apps, now I'm getting use to all of this Linux stuff, say this is pretty cool...hmmm maybe I don't need Windows after all...

    See what I mean? If I can have access to Linux software from my Windows computer then eventually I might just kick the Windows habit- at the very least I'm using more OSS and am more likely to support it in the future.

    This could well be my gateway into the world of OSS!

  11. How 'bout BSD? by Eck · · Score: 2, Interesting

    What I'd like to see is a Debian distro on the BSD kernel. They've got a HURD distro, which is very cool. If they're trying to show how unbiased they are, wouldn't it make more sense to help heal the smaller divisions with the BSD community first? Not to mention that it would be extremely handy to be able to do apt-get updates on a BSD pf firewall...

  12. Navite Win32 utilities. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    I think it is great that there will be a cygwin-w32 architecture available through the Debian packaging system. However, what I would really like to see are native ports of GNU & other freeware packages. I've used Emacs, Vim, and MiKTeX on windows, as well as many file-utils and devel-utils have been ported, partially listed here or here (compiled primarily the MinGW or DJGPP compilers), but they are not centrally available or managed. I would also argue that the Debian branch for cygwin programs should be called w32-cygwin, and the native programs be under w32.

    Just some more thoughts to fuel the fire.

  13. Re:At first by Daniel · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Are there any private projects to provide an alternate isntaller for Debian?

    I'm not sure what you mean by "private", but Joey Hess (joeyh) is working on a complete replacement for the current installer, which hopefully will be used for the release after woody. (at which point the current installer will be taken out back and shot, and everyone will breathe a sigh of relief)

    See Adam di Carlo's recent interview for more information on the installation system.

    Daniel

    --
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