Microsoft Open Sources Windows Subsystem for Linux

Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) is now open source, Microsoft said Monday. The tool, which allows developers to run Linux distributions directly in Windows, is available for download, modification, and contribution. 'We want Windows to be a great dev box,' said Pavan Davuluri, corporate VP at Microsoft. 'Having great WSL performance and capabilities' allows developers 'to live in the Windows-native experience and take advantage of all they need in Linux.'

First launched in 2016 with an emulated Linux kernel, WSL switched to using the actual Linux kernel in 2019 with WSL 2, improving compatibility. The system has since gained support for GPUs, graphical applications, and systemd. Microsoft significantly refactored core Windows components to make WSL a standalone system before open sourcing it.

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