File System Improvements To the Windows Subsystem for Linux (microsoft.com)

An anonymous reader shares a new article published on MSDN: In the latest Windows Insider build, the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) now allows you to manually mount Windows drives using the DrvFs file system. Previously, WSL would automatically mount all fixed NTFS drives when you launch Bash, but there was no support for mounting additional storage like removable drives or network locations. Now, not only can you manually mount any drives on your system, we've also added support for other file systems such as FAT, as well as mounting network locations. This enables you to access any drive, including removable USB sticks or CDs, and any network location you can reach in Windows all from within WSL.

Comments

good

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm glad to see Microsoft fixing basic Linux problems. Perhaps this is the years of Linux on Windows on the desktop.

Windows turning into another Linux distro?

[Anonymous Coward]

Seems like Microsoft is headed rapidly towards migrating towards full Linux compatibility. Soon we'll be able to run WINE under Windows.

wow

[mattyj]

They ported the 'mount' command to Linux! How novel!

What's next, 'dir'?

Re:Any chance we can port this out

[tlhIngan]

It probably translates all the Linux calls into Windows calls straight into Windows' NTFS driver. So, probably not useful for what you're thinking.

Indeed that's what it is.

WSL is effectively "GNU/kWindows" where Linux ELF binaries can run on the Windows kernel using the Linux kernel personality that translates Linux calls into Windows NT Kernel calls and where security, filesystems, etc are handled by the Windows kernel as expected.

There's no linux code actually in the system (other than perhaps headers translating the syscall numbers into actual system calls). Likewise, networking is done via Windows NDIS networking, as well as all the other kernel services. Several times I had to sit down and figure out what was actually happening - I had to add an /etc/hosts entry and i needed to figure out how it worked. (Hint: WSL is a kernel layer, so what happens is glibc will look at /etc/hosts, so I should edit the ubuntu /etc/hosts, not the Windows one. The Windows one is used by the Win32 resolver, while the Ubuntu one is used by glibc, and the tools I was using use glibc).

Re:Linux is sadly becoming irrelevant.

[LVSlushdat]

Man, you ARE delusional.. Linux is the ONLY OS that doesn't treat *your* data as belonging to either Microsoft or Apple.. I used/supported Windows for 20 years as a sysadmin but when I retired I decided I was DONE with anything MS.. And after seeing what a nightmare shitfest Windows 10 is, I thank my lucky stars that something like Linux exists..

Re:Linux is sadly becoming irrelevant.

[chipschap]

It still doesn't offer a desktop environment that's as pleasant to use as Windows .../p>

I wouldn't characterize the Windows desktop environment as "pleasant to use" in any way, shape or form. I realize it's a matter of individual taste, but I've heard very few people (other than someone on the MS payroll) describe Windows as pleasant.

Now, I don't know that I'd describe the various Linux desktops as necesarily "pleasant" but I would describe many as highly usable and an enabler in getting work done. I wouldn't describe Windows in such a way, either.

Re:What is it?

[OrangeTide]

Oh my, how you youngsters so quickly forget the Halloween documents.