100639104
submission
Billly Gates writes:
Windows 10 build 1803 has come out this month, but with some problems. Anandtech has a link with the review examing many new features which include much better support for Linux. WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux) now has native Curt and Tar from the command prompt as well as a utility to convert Unix to Windows pathnames called WSLpath.exe which is documented here. In addition it was mentioned on slashdot in the past about OpenSSH being ported natively to win32 in certain early builds. It now seems the reason was for Linux interoperability with this spring update 2. Unix sockets mean you can run Kali Linux on Windows 10 for penetration testing or run an Apache server in the background with full Linux networking support. Deemons now run in the background even with the command prompt closed. I do have to wonder if Microsoft's critics with Embrace, Extend, and Extinguish, is planned as it seems Windows 10 is being test ground for the eventual running Linux apps on Windows Sever the ultimate plan? So far it is just a geek thing to run a few Linux utilities on a corporate desktop or debug mobile apps on Android. This could be a sign that Microsoft is serious on running Linux apps on Windows if Microsoft wants to go this way.
100223986
submission
Billly Gates writes:
Microsoft has a demo of Ubuntu utilizing the WSL but for ARM versions of Windows 10. Could this also be planned for future versions of Windows ARM Server where Microsoft is adding Linux containers and Linux apps on Windows Server and Azure?
99235469
submission
Billly Gates writes:
Debian is now available in the Windows app store. It joins Ubuntu, Suse Leap, SuSe enterprise, and Kali Linux for those who can not or do not want to bother with a virtual machine or a full install of the OS. However, it included stable 9.3. 9.4 is available from the repository if you run apt-get update and apt-get upgrade.
96133447
submission
Billly Gates writes:
Beta 4 of redstone which is the codename for the spring version of creators update for 2018 has host of new features. Besides a Timeline, graphical Windows Shell improvements with Microsoft's design language, it also includes improved Unix support. A previous story mentioned a discovered OpenSSH for Windows. Beta 4 of redstone aka build 17063 includes BSD utilities BSD tar and curl from the command prompt and Unix sockets (AF_Unix). These are also rumored to be part of a future version of Windows Server. WSL will now run background tasks and will continue to run even after the command prompt window is closed. Other WSL improvements include elevated and non elevated tasks can run together in scheduled tasks. OpenSSH and VPN can now be accessed via PowerShell in remote connections via the PSRemote commandlet. With the extra background support added you can for example keep a Secure Shell session open on a server/client and reconnect later. Also a tool is available called WSLPath to convert Linux to Windows path options:
-a force result to absolute path format
-u translate from a Windows path to a WSL path (default)
-w translate from a WSL path to a Windows path
-m translate from a WSL path to a Windows path, with ‘/’ instead of ‘\\’
Some of WSL features in past version of WIndows 10 are making it into Windows Server 2016 so these features maybe present in future version of server versions of Windows as well.
94078495
submission
Billly Gates writes:
I would assume this is the final nail in the coffin for Windows Phone and the rumored Surface Phone which may never see the light of day. Over the past few months we have seen a change in Microsoft with them being friendly to Linux with stories of porting .NET core over to Linux, helping write a custom Linux kernel, as well as introduction the not-so-popular-onslashdot WSL Ubuntu for WIndows 10.
We may have found the motive as Bill Gates (not me) stated he has no love for IOS and uses a large selection of Microsoft software on his Android device. It appears Microsoft wants to either be a mobile developers friend with Visual Studio which has Android emulators and WSL or maybe Microsoft or they are planning a MS distribution of Android as the tools are in place with Ubuntu, Node.js, Python, Microsoft Code editor, and the Visual Studio 2017 Community Edition?
Some of the old timers on this site may remember when IBM was the bad boy in the I.T. industry and changed when they lost the PC to cloners and MS DOS. Could we be seeing a new Microsoft now that the world is moving to mobile and they have no operating system in it? What is everyone's thoughts on this as all these stories would have been unimaginable last decade?
93968865
submission
Billly Gates writes:
Microsoft and Cannoical's relationship is getting closer besides Ubuntu for Windows. Azure will soon be offering more customized Ubuntu containers with a MS optimized kernel. Uname -r will show 4.11.0-1011-azure for Ubuntu cloud based 16.04 LTS. If you want the non MS kernel you can still use it on Azure by typing: $ sudo apt install linux-virtual linux-cloud-tools-virtual
$ sudo apt purge linux*azure
$ sudo reboot
The article mentions several benefits over the generic Linux kernel for Azure
93222377
submission
Billly Gates writes:
Microsoft recently released Visual Studio 15.3 for Windows and Visual Studio 7.1 for Mac with .NET core 2.0. In addition to porting Microsoft Code and SQL Server to Linux they have ported .NET. Redhat will bundle .NET in their software offerings instead of relying on Mono. .NET core is Microsoft's opensource .NET platform which is not based off Mono and available for Linux, Mac, and Windows here.
92647173
submission
Billly Gates writes:
Linux is not the only free opensource operating system. FreeBSD which is based off of the historical BSD Unix in which TCP/IP was developed on from the University of California at Berkeley has been updated. It does not include SystemD nor PulseAudio and is popular in many web server installations and networking devices.
FreeBSD 11.1 is out with improvements in UEFI and Amazon cloud support in addition to updated userland programs. EFI improvements including a new utility efivar(8) to manage UEFI variables, EFI boot from TFTP or NFS, as well as Microsoft Hyper-V UEFI and Securebooot for generation 2 virtual machines for both Windows Server and Windows 10 Professional hosts. FreeBSD 11.1 also has extended support Amazon Cloud features. A new networking stack for Amazon has been added with the ena(4) driver which adds support for Amazon EC2 platform. This also adds support for using Amazon EC2 NFS shares and support for the Amazon Elastic Filesystem for NFS. For application updates FreeBSD 11.1 Clang, LLVM, LLD, LLDB, and libc++ to version 4.0.0. ZFS has been updated too with a new zfsbootcfg with minor performance improvements. Downloads are here which include Sparc, PowerPC, and even custom SD card images for Raspberry Pi, Beagle-bone and other devices
89679817
submission
Billly Gates writes:
Right now it only works on WSL with bash on Windows 10 but it can be used to compile Linux programs natively on Linux itself. Instructions are included here
87626453
submission
Billly Gates writes:
For all the system-D haters who want a modern distro feel free to rejoice. The Debian fork called Devuan is almost done completing a daunting task of stripping SystemD dependencies from Debian. Duvuan Linux is not init only. Duvuan gives the user a choice of SystemD, sysv init, openrc, and others
87229205
submission
Billly Gates writes:
Trump's transition team is steam rolling ahead to transition the government. Trump chose Myron Ebell to oversee environmental policies. Myron Ebell is a director of the CoolHeads Coalition a group of climate change denialists and alarmists.
73288835
submission
Billly Gates writes:
Arstechnica has the scoop on a new build with less flat icons and a confirmation of a mid July release date. While Microsoft is in a hurry to fix the damage by the Windows 8 versions of its operating system the question next is if it is ready for prime time? On Neowin a list of problems are already mentioned by MS and its users with this latest release including wifi and sound not working without a reboot and users complaining about tiles and apps not working in the new start menu. Also the new Microsoft browser EDGE/aka Spartan will be shipping without plugin support at RTM which could damage its reputation as an IE killer as one of the disadvantages of IE compared to Firefox or Chrome was the lack of real browser extensions. Also this new build takes away color from the titlebars similiar to Office 2013 which bothers some users as well. What is not known is if Microsoft plans to have OEMs sell new computers with Windows 10 in the middle of July? Or will this mean OEM's will get the official version for testing and deployment in the middle of July too while Microsoft fixes the bugs for the next 1 — 3 months before it comes standard on all new pcs?
71377079
submission
Billly Gates writes:
Since Unity has been given a liberal license and free for non commercial developers it has become popular. A computer science student used the tool to remake SuperMario 64 with a modern Unity 5 engine. There is a video here and if you want to play the link is here. You will need Firefox or Chrome which has HTML 5 for gamepad support if you do not want to use the keyboard.
66630257
submission
Billly Gates writes:
What would be unthinkable a decade ago is Visual Studio supporting W3C HTML and CSS and now apps on other platforms. Visual Studio 2015 preview is available for download which includes support for LLVM/Clang, Android development, and even Linux development with Mono using Xamarin. A little more detail is here. A tester also found support for Java, ANT, SQL LITE, and WebSocket4web. We see IE improving in terms of more standards and Visual Studio Online even supports IOS and MacOSX development. Is this a new Microsoft emerging? In any case it is nice to have an alternative to Google tools for Android development.
62288613
submission
Billly Gates writes:
A leaked alpha of Windows 9 has been brewing on the internet. Today a screenshot shows what MS showed us at BUILD which includes a start menu with additional tiny tiles for things like people, calendar, pc settings, and news etc. What the screenshot does show is it is much bigger than Windows7 taking 1/3 of the screen similar to the Start Screen which will show more apps (frequently used desktop apps) in addition to other features. Is this a shift for MS to fix Windows 8? Or do some of us who are really still used to XP and Windows 7 won't allow anything modern in it? Also what is unknown is the return of AERO, and how will Cortana fit voice control fit in?
