Microsoft Open-Sources WSL Sample To Let More Linux Distributions Run On Windows

The process is now more clear how Linux distributions can be adapted to run on Microsoft's Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) with the company now having open-sourced a "WSL Sample" to build WSL distribution packages for the Microsoft Store and for allowing custom Linux distribution packages to be sideloaded onto systems.

The WSL-DistroLauncher is what is now open-source and is a C++ code-base offering a launcher that can be customized for particular distributions for the steps to get to a log-in shell, running commands, and setting configuration values.

The newly-opened code is available on GitHub via Microsoft/WSL-DistroLauncher. The code is under an MIT license.

Microsoft's Tara Raj has written a post further explaining the WSL Sample.

Coincidentally I am in the process of running some fresh WSL Linux benchmarks following Debian recently being added to the Microsoft Store. Those results should be out in the next day or two.