View source for WSL

Notes on running NixOS on the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL, WSL2).

== Setup ==

Ensure that WSL is installed and up to date.

<syntaxhighlight lang="powershell">
wsl --install
wsl --update
</syntaxhighlight>

Sometimes you'll have to install WSL2 manually by [https://github.com/microsoft/WSL/releases downloading the msi-installation package].

NixOS is [https://github.com/microsoft/WSL/issues/11206 not yet packaged] as a official WSL distribution or on the Microsoft store. Download the latest release of <code>nixos-wsl.tar.gz</code> from the [https://github.com/nix-community/NixOS-WSL/releases NixOS-WSL Github page].

Import the WSL container using PowerShell

<syntaxhighlight lang="powershell">
wsl --import NixOS .\NixOS\ nixos-wsl.tar.gz --version 2
</syntaxhighlight>

== Usage ==

Start it with PowerShellː

<syntaxhighlight lang="powershell">
wsl -d NixOS
</syntaxhighlight>

== Tips and tricks ==

=== Run container on startup ===

To run the distro <code>NixOS</code> on Windows startup or user login in the background, use these commands in PowerShellː

<syntaxhighlight lang="powershell">
echo "" > $HOME\run_wsl2_at_startup.vbs
notepad $HOME\run_wsl2_at_startup.vbs
</syntaxhighlight>

Inside the script we define <code>NixOS</code> as the distribution name, as imported in the setup step above.

{{file|$HOME\run_wsl2_at_startup.vbs|vbscript|<nowiki>
set object = createobject("wscript.shell") 
object.run "wsl.exe --distribution NixOS", 0
</nowiki>}}

Open the task schedulerː

<syntaxhighlight lang="powershell">
taskschd.msc
</syntaxhighlight>

Click on <code>Create task</code> on the right pane, set name to <code>WSL</code>. On the tab "Triggers" click on "New ..." and select "run task on user login" in the dropdown menu. On the tab "Action" click on "New ..." and insert as command: <code>%USERPROFILE%\run_wsl2_at_startup.vbs</code>
[[Category:Container]]