I absolutely loathe WSL at work. Users with local non-AD connected systems (which bypass GPOs) install it, then start making highly insecure configurations that result in PII nightmares.
It’s a goddamned cancer riddled bastard child of Linux and Windows that needs the Ol’ Yeller treatment.
I’m guilty of using WSL to bypass what the IT department has done, but that’s partly due to our IT department being borderline useless. To prove my point to them one time, I took a project and compiled it in Windows normally, in a fresh Windows VM, and in WSL. A 20 second compile in WSL took 2 minutes on the Windows host.
similar but lesser case at work… I was given some 50 K records to analyze, I needed to perform some matches and the records came in flat csv files
I was told by IT that excel was my only option… after 4 hours of it crashing I gave up and did it all on WSL CLI commads, it took less than 45 seconds to execute
I installed WSL out of spite to show that my program compiled way faster when the AV didn’t know about it. It went from 18 minutes to about 6.
I’m sure you can find better examples… Not only is a small time window, it also seems to me is more to do with tooling on each environment than your actual IT.
Oh I can think of many examples. That was just the latest one.
There was also the time that IT decided that industrial controls technicians didn’t need the ability to manually set IP addresses, or the time where they managed to have %Documents% point to a network share, while they were simultaneously trying to sort out wifi coverage issues.
“If you didn’t want me running nmap scans on the corporate network, you shouldn’t have let my account use the network interface”
My work would be impossible without WSL, and yes I am guilty of hiding from the security systems… Because the security systems are so invasive they keep locking files I’m trying to open so IDEs don’t even work properly under Windows.
Users with local non-AD connected systems (which bypass GPOs)
Found your problem. Nothing to do with Linux/WSL.
Windows
thatneeds the Ol’ Yeller treatment.FTFY
I don’t know what a native Linux PC is. Does that mean is runs the OS without a noticeable accent?
Real answer: this is talking about computers with windows 11 installed that also run Ubuntu through a service called WSL, or Windows Subsystem for Linux; basically you have a windows 11 pc that can do linux stuff too.
A native Ubuntu machine would be installed directly to the hard drive and booted that way.
Makes sense, thanks. Also seemingly an odd brag. Seems like putting out an article that you’re commonly the side piece.
Yeah. I highly suspect its mostly people who need Ubuntu for job purposes and have security policies or just the C-suite refusing to follow the times
I wouldn’t call WSL service, Linux environment integrated into Windows is more accurate. With WSL 2, Linux actually runs using a lightweight virtual machine with a real Linux kernel, while still being tightly integrated with Windows. It’s a proper Ubuntu (or whatever you want really) installation that you can run a production server off of.
Native Linux PCs speak in penguinese and celebrate their mesiah the great Torvaldius giver of kernels.
I’ve heard rumors he turned to the dark side.
Canonical should be able to see the warning sign in there
Not really. Microsoft did WSL to keep Linux users from leaving, and to gain back Windows server share. Both worked, but keeping me in Windows by allowing me to use Linux means I’m still using, expanding my usage, and becoming more dependent on Linux.
It’s exposing Windows devs to Linux, and getting people using it. Every WSL installation of Ubuntu is an installation that likely would never have been done otherwise.
I am saying, the warning sign is if each time more of the linux installs are just wsl instead of people willingly installing ubuntu at their pc
It was a suicide strategy. It only works if you improve windows and have that as a bridge to make incoming travel easier. They build the best possible bridge to a garbage dump and are stumped that nobody is buying high priced Jersey real estate.
Linux nerds: “Ahh, you use Windows! You should be using Linux like me!” pushes up glasses
Some person: “Oh, OK. Ubuntu looks nice.”
LN: “NO NOT THAT ONE. That one is for losers or intellectually challenged people! You must like the one I like!” pushes glasses up into brain
(And we wonder why people don’t take the time to switch. Some of you guys are toxic.)
I get this is a meme but I’ve never been given a hard time for using the “wrong” distro. Ever. This is an urban legend that refuses to die. The Linux community is honestly kinder than most other tech community (on average. We have our share of assholes too of course). I’m a theatre major, a script kiddie in more ways than one. Not a comp sci major. The Linux community has never cared what skill level I’m at. We help eachother and make cool shit.
Seriously I’m a lot to deal with and I am positive I have absolutely infuriated a developer or two along the way and it’s never been a problem. This community is ridiculously kind and accommodating. We need to drop the edgelord BS already.
Linux is for people who want their devices to do what they tell them to do, not what shareholders tell them to do. Pick a flavor, break some shit, dig out of the hole.
I got the “intellectually challenged” comment from a reply on this very post.
https://lemmy.world/comment/25386713
I’m not going to say all Linux people are mean or anything, but there’s absolutely a “I use Linux and therefore I’m better” mentality that floats around, and even some “I use the BETTER distro (read: whatever that person happens to like) so I’m even BETTER.”
And I like Linux! Two of my machines in my house are Linux computers. But I do think some Linux folks like to smell their own farts.
I chided someone earlier today for what I thought was a neckbeard superiority complex. It was a cheap shot. It’s a lot better than it used to be. The nerds tolerate you if you use Mint.
Great headline, a failure for both companies. Haha! Yeah, I am a cynic and dislike canonical
Both companies are failures.
what makes them “failures”?
i hate windows and i don’t use Ubuntu but it’s difficult to consider Microsoft or Canonical as failures.
I’m sure this is VMs in corporate environments.
This is backwards. Running Linux within Windows is such a waste of resources and mitigates a lot of the great things about Linux. Each to their own.
Yeah, go tell that to your company’s IT department.
That’s what WSL is used for: keeping developers somewhat sane in a company that’s Windows-only.
Yeah they’re squares
That’s because Ubuntu is the standard devops platform for intellectually challenged software engineers who don’t like choosing a quality development platform because they fear lack of documentation since Ubuntu was the distro standard for 15+ years.
Hence why its also highly used as a podman/docker image base.
And why actual linux users tend to switch or pick a superior distro.
Your average new user (non gamer)isn’t going to know about window emulators so I can see why they go ubuntu when it’s supported by software such as pcoip for example.
Despite that it and any windows program can be run on any distro using free stuff like heroic if you want a fancy button
This is happening because Linux is the default OS for servers, robots, machines, etc., it just sucks balls for normie personal computing, so they’ll use Winblows for the basic stuff, and WSL for the server-centric tasks.
Ubuntu can make it as toddler-centric as it wants, it won’t change the fact that eventually a person will find a thing their machine won’t do without an on-staff geek.
If they have heart, they’ll try chasing the black screen into the depths of google oblivion or use AI for infinitely recirculating bad advice. It’s ironic that a LLM running on a Linux server can’t fix Linux.
Most people will punt and go back to Microsucks which grows more evil and abusive every day.
I’m just mad I can’t get any of my file-management containers to work properly.
Tell me one thing that is harder to do on Linux than on Windows nowadays. Something coming from OS itself, not from hostile vendor the community managed to patch support for.
print something on a piece of paper.
Was the last time you used any Linux distro 30 years ago? Shit is basically plug n play nowadays…
My self-hosted services run on a repurposed thinkstation with a headless Debian install.
I had a Mint VM I loaded up with stuff - bottles, etc. It was all going pretty well, the install was almost as big as winblows which I wasn’t excited about, but I really like Mint. I had a Linux Lite VM i was using for a separate secure connection to my work vnc. I didn’t want my personal computer being legally discoverable just because I used it to connect to the mothership. On both of those, I wasn’t doing a lot of sharing, printing, or other intermediate or hardware tasks.
For what I was doing, it worked pretty mostly fine. There was always a level of tinkering that is beyond what a normie would be willing or able to do. I do get tired of having to manually enter the commands to make the distro display correctly on my ultrawide monitor, but it is understandable.
I don’t hate Linux. I like it. It has gotten a lot better in the last 20 years; I’ve watched it happen. There are just some things that remain frustrating, especially since I’m too dumb to remember CLI along with all the other things I know.
