Linux distributions running on Windows in WSL2 virtual machines can now use the init system.
This week, Microsoft and Canonical jointly announced the news that the latest versions of the Windows subsystem for Linux 2 (version 0.67.6 and later) have been modified to support systemd. The Canonical blog post contains some technical details and an opportunity to promote something outside the LXD container.
The corresponding Microsoft announcement is less technical and the YouTube demo video is less technical, but it claims that there are several third-party workarounds that have achieved the same result.
registration He predicted this about a year ago and we think this may have something to do with System CEO Lennart Pottering, who joined the Windows giant a few months ago.
sudo systemctl stop smiling… Lennart Poetting May 2015
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For clarity, this is for WSL2, the second generation of the Windows subsystem for Linux. WSL2 uses a subset of the Windows operating system’s built-in Hyper-V capabilities to run an entire Linux kernel inside a dedicated virtual machine. The original version 1 of WSL was a completely different tool that did not include a full Linux kernel.
In the joint Microsoft / Canonical demo video, Linux features that require systemd functionality include MicroK8s (pronounced “small cases” and does not mention Kubernetes), NextCloud, and Canonical Shared Package Format. Examples of tools such as Snap are shown.
