I realise that this might be a bit of a trivial question but it has been bugging me for months and I can’t take it any longer. I have noticed that I “own” a “Ubuntu for Windows” application in Microsoft Store. Now, I know what the other apps with the LTS version numbers are for and even the one named just “Ubuntu” but can’t figure out how I got this particular app.
This app is not searchable and hence I am supplying a link to it.
“Ubuntu on Windows” is a previous version of Ubuntu 20.04. We published “Ubuntu” to replace it which is in searchable in the store and “Ubuntu on Windows” has been hidden so it doesn’t break link access which is still used by wsl --install in Windows 10 for example or might be referred by documentation.
“Ubuntu on Windows” will be removed at some point and “Ubuntu” will be upgraded from 20.04 to 22.04.
@jibel I just registered and I can’t create a topic so asking here - what is the difference between the Ubuntu on Windows MS Store WSL version and Ubuntu Server or Ubuntu Desktop? The WSL version is often used headless so I expect it to not include all the packages of Ubuntu Desktop but I get the impression it has more than Ubuntu Server.
I want to use a similar image both for local development workstations and in the cloud.
WSL and server images are close.
The comparison of the seeds of server and WSL shows that the server image has devices and blocks utilities, and cloud configuration tools that WSL doesn’t have. WSL has fonts for better rendering in WSLg, and of course, all the boot-related packages like the kernel or the bootloader have been expurged for a smaller footprint.
You can perfectly use WSL for local development and in the cloud. They both use the same Ubuntu repositories, and you can install on WSL your tools of choice for cloud development.
UPDATE: I guess I need to download from https://github.com/ubuntu/WSL/releases - will try that!
@jibel I noticed that for FocalFossa (20.04) the WSL rootfs is published at http://cloud-images.ubuntu.com/daily/server/focal/current/ in this line:
[ ] focal-server-cloudimg-amd64-wsl.rootfs.tar.gz 2023-09-15 22:21 531M File system image and Kernel packed
However, for 22.04 downloading via http://cloud-images.ubuntu.com/daily/server/jammy/current/ I don’t see a WSL rootfs. Is this intentional? Is there a place I can get it?
I want to provision my WSL2 instance via a script so ideally I could grab the image or rootfs file somewhere. And I’d rather go straight to the source rather than mucking around with the Microsoft Store.
Starting from Jammy we moved WSL root filesystems to their own directory:
You’ll find daily builds of all the supported releases.
I have both “Ubuntu on Windows” and “Ubuntu 20.04 on Windows” listed in my “Installed apps” page. Do I need them both or can I uninstall one of them? The name listed when I run “wsl -l -v” is “Ubuntu”.
Double check what version of Ubuntu you’re running in WSL with lsb_release -a. If it’s Ubuntu 22.04 LTS, then you should be able to remove the Ubuntu 20.04 on Windows app.
But back up any important data first, and know that WSL is only running while you’re actively using it (and for a couple minutes after you stop), so there’s no drawback to having both installed other than disk space.
I have “Ubuntu on Windows” installed from a while ago (when it was the only option). I read above that it will be removed at some point (it’s already a hidden link at this point). How can I migrate effectively from this to just the “Ubuntu” package, so I don’t experience any interruptions? Can I just install the “Ubuntu” package and uninstall the other without breaking anything? I have a significant number of packages installed and my setup isn’t very portable, so I’m hoping not to have to migrate things manually from one installation to the other.
For the record, I have the latest WSL kernel installed (wsl --update), and I’m on Ubuntu 22.04.3 LTS on my “Ubuntu on Windows” installation (which I achieved by doing sudo do-release-upgrade from 18.04 → 20.04 and then again from 20.04 → 22.04 today).