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Microsoft Windows 10 Gains Linux/WSL Console Copy and Paste Functionality (betanews.com) 168

Posted by msmash from the coooool dept.
BrianFagioli writes: For better or worse, the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) initiative seems to be moving full steam ahead. There are some very respectable distributions available in the Microsoft Store, such as Debian, Ubuntu, and Kali to name a few. Not to mention, Microsoft is trying to encourage even more maintainers to submit their distros with a new tool.

Apparently, some Windows 10 users have been clamoring for the ability to copy and paste both from and to WSL consoles -- a reasonable request. Well, as of Insider Build 17643, this is finally possible.

'As of Windows 10 Insider build #17643, you can copy/paste text from/to Linux/WSL Consoles!!! We know that this is a feature MANY of you have been waiting for -- our sincerest thanks for your patience and continued support while we untangled the Console's internals, allowing us to implement this feature. To ensure that we don't break any existing behaviors, you'll need to enable the 'Use Ctrl+Shift+C/V as Copy/Paste' option in the Console 'Options' properties page,' says Rich Turner, Microsoft.
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Microsoft Windows 10 Gains Linux/WSL Console Copy and Paste Functionality More

Microsoft Windows 10 Gains Linux/WSL Console Copy and Paste Functionality

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  • How long before... (Score:1, Insightful)

    by b0s0z0ku ( 752509 )

    What is the endgame here? How long before MS considers mandating locked-down bootloaders on all Win 10 machines, even Intel? After all, WSL gives users a "choice" of operating system, so they no longer "need" to boot a different OS.

    No thanks to that or WSL. I'd rather run Linux over bare metal and put Windows in a nice, padded, VirtualBox cell. It gets to communicate/update/run when *I* (rarely) allow it to, not whenever the machine is on.

    • not on servers and not in the EU

      • Well, some of us don't live in the EU and want to run desktop Linux not locked-down Win 10 or MacOS junk... there's always the option of importing unlocked hardware, I guess.

        • Well, some of us don't live in the EU and want to run desktop Linux not locked-down Win 10 or MacOS junk... there's always the option of importing unlocked hardware, I guess.

          MacOS is not used to run Linux on a Mac.

          • I never said it was. I said that I hope there will always be more (ideally free) bare metal choices on the desktop, not just OS products from Apple, MS, and Google.

            • I never said it was. I said that I hope there will always be more (ideally free) bare metal choices on the desktop, not just OS products from Apple, MS, and Google.

              You said it was locked down. When I run Linux on my Mac - it's not locked down at all. Then of course, if a person knows Unix, neither is MacOS.

              • With Mac going ARM, will the ARM MacOS be more of a walled garden like iOS. Will ARM Macs still permit Boot-Camp type dual-booting?

                • Re: (Score:3)

                  by PPH ( 736903 )

                  With Mac going ARM

                  But will Apple implement a locked bootloader?* Or leave it open? Locking it (per Microsoft's specification) does exactly one thing: It gives a user the ability to load Windows on their hardware. Not something Apple would seem to be promoting.

                  *Apple may implement a locked bootloader with their own keys, to enable a signed MacOS to run. And then they might sign a Linux bootloader as well. But just kick Microsoft to the curb.

          • MacOS is not used to run Linux on a Mac.

            It can be. macOS includes Apple's Hypervisor.framework [apple.com], atop which tools (such as xhyve [github.com]) can be used to run Linux inside macOS.

            This is how Docker for Mac [docker.com] works; it runs the Linux kernel inside Apple's Hypervisor.framework, allowing you to run Linux containers. If you have XQuartz installed, with a bit of fiddling you can run Linux GUI apps inside Docker containers on the macOS desktop.

            Yaz

            • MacOS is not used to run Linux on a Mac.

              It can be. macOS includes Apple's Hypervisor.framework [apple.com], atop which tools (such as xhyve [github.com]) can be used to run Linux inside macOS.

              This is how Docker for Mac [docker.com] works; it runs the Linux kernel inside Apple's Hypervisor.framework, allowing you to run Linux containers. If you have XQuartz installed, with a bit of fiddling you can run Linux GUI apps inside Docker containers on the macOS desktop.

              Yaz

              I wonder if I can run Linux inside Windows using parallels?

              • I wonder if I can run Linux inside Windows using parallels?

                I'm not sure why you'd want to, but I certainly see no reason why you couldn't do this.

                Yaz

          • My vmware and parallels VMs disagree.

            • My vmware and parallels VMs disagree.

              My live distro installs and option boot disagrees with your disagreeing. Zero need for MacOS.

              • Of course there is zero need for Mac OS, but the parent claimed linux does not run on Macs or no one is runing Linux on Macs, so what is your point?
                You have no Mac and run Linux on a no Mac? ... Pretty pointless argument.

                • Of course there is zero need for Mac OS, but the parent claimed linux does not run on Macs or no one is runing Linux on Macs, so what is your point? You have no Mac and run Linux on a no Mac? ... Pretty pointless argument.

                  What I was replying to was:

                  Well, some of us don't live in the EU and want to run desktop Linux not locked-down Win 10 or MacOS junk

                  Now there might be some parsing to be done over whether the Poster was separating the two - "locked down" only for Windows 10 or MacOS only as junk, referring to W10 only and MacOS separately , but that would be an unusual narrative since the typical fan calls MacOS as locked down.

                  Otherwise, have a good day.

                  • What I was replying to was:
                    Well, some of us don't live in the EU and want to run desktop Linux not locked-down Win 10 or MacOS junk

                    Then you replied to the wrong post/person.

                    • What I was replying to was: Well, some of us don't live in the EU and want to run desktop Linux not locked-down Win 10 or MacOS junk

                      Then you replied to the wrong post/person.

                      That's not how this works. That's not how any of this works.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      You mean the thing you freetards have been claiming Microsoft would do for 5+ years and Apple is supposed to be doing any moment for nearly a decade? Doesn’t it get old being so wrong with these doom and gloom predictions that never pan out?

      • They're trying to lock down OS and app choices with abominations like Win 10S, Win RT, and locked bootloaders on ARM. They may succeed, they may not. Anyway, thank G_d for easily compromised Chinese hardware which will always give the choice, whether M$ likes it or not.
        • That is no different to many Android or IOS tablets. They are designed for a market that isn't going to customise them, this reduces production and support costs as it is a nice fixed target.
          • Which is why I own laptops as computers, not locked-down tablet junk. Most tablets are great for watching movies, otherwise utter junk. The thought of using one makes me want to eat a THC tablet :)
            • which is why I only use a tablet for a few games and watching movies. It is also why I prefer a PC to a laptop, laptop is great for portability and work but it sucks for customisation as well.

    • Re:How long before... (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Rob Y. ( 110975 ) on Sunday April 15, 2018 @03:02PM (#56442069)

      The endgame is to marginalize desktop Linux as much as possible. This WSL thing is not desktop linux at all - it's a way to make sure linux back-end developers run Windows on their desktops instead of using desktop linux as the only way to bring their development environment with them.

      And maybe, just maybe, that's enough for today's Microsoft. Sure, they'd love to lock down the hardware farther - and they may well try to do it. But they don't need to. Back-end Linux is no longer a threat to them - if only because they've already lost that battle. These days they'd rather you pay them to run Linux for you on their Azure cloud than worry about the fact that you're not using Windows for back-end development. But anything that marginalizes the Windows desktop stands a chance of harming the cash cow that makes the rest of their business work. So, Chromebooks are definitely a threat. Android, again, was a threat up until the moment that Microsoft conceded they'd lost that battle too. The biggest difference between today's Microsoft and Ballmer's is that they're capable of admitting loss and have figured out how to thrive anyway.

      • Re:How long before... (Score:5, Insightful)

        by modmans2ndcoming ( 929661 ) on Sunday April 15, 2018 @04:01PM (#56442373)

        The end game is to provide access to the tools developers like to use. They don't give a shit about "marginalizing Linux on the desktop" The Desktop isn't even a market they are interested in anymore.

        • A comment that makes sense, at last. Mod this up.

          (And yes, I have been a user of this linux-in-Windows since the first regular release.)

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Rob Y. ( 110975 )

          Well, okay. But they sure don't like that developers like to use linux-based tools. They'd still prefer them to use Microsoft tools - enough so that they're releasing linux-based versions of some of those tools. They're not doing that because they love linux. They're doing it because if they don't, they will become more irrelevant on the back end than they already are. It's all well and good that Azure supports linux, but for the most part businesses that choose Azure do it because they still have some

          • 1) Why wouldn't a company want to make it's products available to as many people as possible?
            2) Try looking at the recent reorg. The Windows division was split up and there is no senior leadership responsible for windows (as a single product) reporting to the CEO for the first time ever. They don't care about desktop as a market anymore. They know they have to maintain it, but it is not a growth market. I would not be surprised if in 5-10 years they just maintain a Linux Subsystem for Windows and direct eve

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Rob Y. ( 110975 )

              1) Well, they never made their products available on linux before - so once upon a time, the plan to supplant Unix/Linux on the back end was enough of a motivation to not make those products available. Granted, that's changed somewhat - but I won't concede it's changed completely.

              2) Linux Subsystem for Windows doesn't support a GUI - or am I wrong? If I'm right, then it is no substitute even for a Chromebook, let alone Windows.

              They don't care about desktop as a growth opportunity any more - even to levera

      • The endgame is to marginalize desktop Linux as much as possible.

        Errr. No. No one at Microsoft gives a crap about the Linux desktop. It barely registers a blip on market share figures. On the other hand they do care quite a bit about Linux being used in 1/3rd of back end instances on their Azure cloud and are trying to give customers a way of using ${APPLICATION} without leaving the Windows environment.

    • How long before MS considers mandating locked-down bootloaders on all Win 10 machines, even Intel?

      Are you sure that they don't already require this because I have been copying and pasting to the WSL console for the past year. The only new thing that they seem to be adding is that you can do it with the usual windows keys instead of using the right mouse button for pasting from Windows->Linux or selecting with the mouse and Ctrl+C for pasting from Linux->Windows. Copy and paste is not a new feature.

      • Correct, if you go to the blog of the Ms developers (https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/commandline/), that's been their comment all along. They knew people (including themselves) wanted a keystroke-based copy-paste in addition to the existing mouse-based copy-paste, they just didn't have the dev cycles to implement it until now.

    • That is not how WSL works.....but yeah...go pretend you know what you are doing.

  • Backwards to me (Score:5, Insightful)

    by slazzy ( 864185 ) on Sunday April 15, 2018 @01:08PM (#56441551) Homepage Journal
    Seems backwards to me. Windows is the shit I need to install and run in a vm on my linux machine from time to time.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by b0s0z0ku ( 752509 )
      Micro$oft wants to force everyone to run Windows on bare metal via locked boot loaders, and graciously allow some people to run "approved" Linux distributions in WSL. They can't monetize user data from users who choose to opt out of Win 10 spyware.

      • and graciously allow some people to run "approved" Linux distributions in WSL

        Except for the tool they released, which was featured on the front page earlier this week, to allow you to install your distro of choice.

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • What's the point? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by fred911 ( 83970 ) on Sunday April 15, 2018 @02:03PM (#56441807) Journal

    And, why would you want to run a high performance OS virtualized on a bloated OS when you can virtualize the bloated OS on top of the high performance OS that has provided this ability for years?

     

    • I have a better question: Why would you think there is any perceptible difference between well virtualised systems on different hosts? I have an even better question: Why would you even bother talking about virtualising when we are talking about running binaries written for Linux on Window's kernel?

      Oh and if you have performance questions about that you'll be happy to know that except for I/O which is quite bottlenecked on WSL, WSL runs raw computing operations faster than any virtualised option including u

    • What bloating from Win10 makes it less performant? I'm curious.

    • WSL isn't virtualization.

  • If you want to run Linux, then run Linux, no one in their right mind is going to run Linux on top of Windows. Running Linux on top of Windows is buying a broken down shack of a house, that's falling apart, and loading it with excellent equipment and technology. If you want to use Linux, then run Linux as your base OS and run Windows in a VM, which actually makes sense, instead of trying to use an excellent OS on top of a broken, 1/2 functional bucket of crap.

    • Re:Why does the WSL exist? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Mascot ( 120795 ) on Sunday April 15, 2018 @02:22PM (#56441929)

      I can't answer for anyone else but, while I have no interest in running a full Linux desktop at this time, I do like some of the tools available in the Linux terminal.

      I did, in the past, try to run Linux as my main desktop, it failed miserably (don't get me started). I tried booting into it for the few tools that I preferred on the platform, it proved to be much too cumbersome to be worth it. Getting easy access to them from within Windows in a fashion that is not Cygwin, is all good in my book.

      So, to answer your question, I guess WSL exists for people like me.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by trawg ( 308495 )

        I'm in the same boat. Every couple years I try Linux on the desktop and each time something frustrating happens within the first few hours - it's usual one or two fairly trivial things but together they have enough of an impact on my workflow or patience to make me decide it's too much effort.

        I've got 20+ years now of Windows desktop knowledge, tools, muscle memory, workflows, etc. It's hard to break that habit; when I need Linux I just ssh to one of a few VPSs I maintain or load up one of a few local VMs I

      • I went through the same the same thing. After the constant new windows builds being pushed to me and removing candy crush for the thousandth time I decided I would try linux on my new laptop. My old laptop is acting as my kind of term server for windows stuff. So you could say I'm "cheating".

        To be fair, my new laptop is an alienware 15" - e.g. a bunch of proprietary crap. I first tried (and am currently running) Mint 17.10 - almost all the different DE versions - but the installer would often lock up or cau

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by nadass ( 3963991 )
      Because sometimes software packages have so many dependency trees that running a virtualized Linux instance ("subsystem") is most reasonable solution, especially when you want to transfer data or networking calls between the software stacks.

      In other words, not all software source-code can be recompiled for native Windows functioning without breaking the Windows environment. This subsystem route provides an isolated environment for the Linux-dependent software to run within a restricted-yet-accessible op

    • A little biased, eh? Your comment reminds me of Spock's reply to a similar comment: Is there something wrong with the mind I have?

    • There is no Linux in WSL.

  • This company is really committed to comp.sci. advancement!

  • Last time I heard copy & paste was not implemented was on the early iOS versions.

    • Give them a break. They literally implemented whole other operating-systems's-worth of Syscalls, and you're complaining about the correct clipboard keyboard shortcuts? (The clipboard works fine, it's just the keyboard shortcuts which are not there since conhost is used for both win32 and wsl)

  • I have been heavily using cygwin for ages. So much so that most people think I am on a linux machine. Cygwin X server too. I have been copy/pasting text between Linux machines' spawning XTerm on Cygwin X server windows, and windows. Also Remote Desktop Windows copy/paste too.

    In fact cygwin terminals, COM terminals, Xterms all copy/paste, but with annoyingly different key combinations. Control-X, /Control-V, shift-ins/control-ins, middle mouse click .... But in theory the text gets copied.

    Anyone migratin

    • WSL is better than CigWin. You get full access to the file system via Bash (or insert any shell you like) and can install any tools you need via the package manager of the distro you setup.

      • I think the file permission quirks of cygwin will be gone too.

        • I moved from Cygwin to WSL when the latter came out. Not sure what the permission quirks are in Cygwin, but the bad news is there are permission quirks in WSL (everything looks like 777). The good news is those will be fixed in the next regular update (and are currently fixed, I'm told, in the Insider Build). Read more here:
          https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.c... [microsoft.com].

          I believe another advantage over Cygwin is that you can install Linux apps directly from the distro's app install, rather than waiting for the Cygwin

      • WSL is better than CigWin. You get full access to the file system via Bash

        But can you run Windows programs inside the WSL environment?

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by Anonymous Coward

          Yes.

        • As AC says, yes. I have a Windows program called Ace Money that I just now launched from bash. I had to provide the full path, I guess I could have added the path to that exe; but of course the Windows model puts almost every exe (etc.) in its own dir, so it might be complicated.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by jon3k ( 691256 )
        What do you mean by "full access"? You can access the filesystem via cygwin too (e.g. - "/cygdrive/c")

        • Yeah, I'm not sure what that person meant. At any rate, from WSL you get to the C drive via /mnt/c

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • You can use ubuntu's (debian's) `apt` to install/update the actual Ubuntu binaries instead of using cygwin's inferior setup.exe to install recompiled win32 binaries linked to a slew of compatibility libraries.

      Try it. You can run them both at the same time - I did for a while until I uninstalled Cygwin.

  • if i happen to have an external disk partition or even another drive inside the PC with a Linux partition, windows would offer to format it and i would always have to click cancel or close, god damn windows thinks it has to be the only operating system allowed on a PC, it wont be friendly and allow another OS live beside it, so when i boot to windows i am always on the watch as to what it wants to do to other disk partitions and drives

  • in just a short time MS could rebuild Windows 11 as a desktop environment sitting on top of Linux.
    The user would be none the wiser, but so much better off.

    • Eh, maybe, maybe not. Don't underestimate Microsoft's powers of creating messes where none should have existed in the first place.

  • makes those fabulous copy pasta stackoverflow abusers that much less likely to make their own mistakes while using someone elses solution to a problem they don't fully understand.

    shittiots.

  • There seems to be a common misunderstanding that WSL is running a Linux kernel. It isn't. WSL is still running on the Windows kernel. People think of popular Linux distributions as being Linux, but they're only Linux because of the kernel, not because of the tools they're bundling to create a distribution. When you switch to a BSD or Mach kernel using the same tools, you're no longer using Linux, regardless of the programs you're running. That's what WSL is too. It's a distribution's bundled tools running on a different kernel, in this case the Windows kernel.

    It'd make more sense to call it Ubuntu on Windows. Really though, it makes more sense for MS to call it "Linux" because that's what people think of when they hear the word. Otherwise you'd have "GNU on Windows" and spend all your time explaining you're talking about running a Linux distribution on Windows without using actual Linux. It's like insisting people use the original meaning of the word "hacker." If you use the word to mean what it really means, then people won't understand what you mean.

    I know this post is pretty much off topic, but a lot of people still seem misled by the term and I hope at to help clear up the misconceptions for a couple people.

    • Is that it's GNU/Windows?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

      There seems to be a common misunderstanding that WSL is running a Linux kernel. It isn't. WSL is still running on the Windows kernel. People think of popular Linux distributions as being Linux, but they're only Linux because of the kernel, not because of the tools they're bundling to create a distribution. When you switch to a BSD or Mach kernel using the same tools, you're no longer using Linux, regardless of the programs you're running. That's what WSL is too. It's a distribution's bundled tools running o

  • Windows uses ctrl C + crtl V

    Linux uses mouse index click to cut, mouse middle click to paste - it's very fast. The Linux paradigm is so far ahead in terms of efficiency than using ^C and ^V, which is really horrible. I shouldn't have to take my hand off the mouse to cut and paste.

    Cygwin allows this on windows, does WSL?

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      > The Linux paradigm is so far ahead in terms of efficiency than using ^C and ^V

      It's not a Linux paradigm, it's an X Window paradigm, and it doesn't work too well when you don't have a mouse. For example, ratpoison (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ratpoison) users.

    • So you are left handed then?

  • We found a better way to design Windows, by utilizing the power of Linux mixed with the look, feel, and all the programs you used on MS Windows 10

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