Installing and Configuring Windows Subsystem for Linux in Cloud Computing

There are several approaches for the joint (simultaneous) operation of several different operating systems on the same computer. These are load managers, virtual machines, emulation systems. Until recently, the main way was to use VMware virtual machines, Virtual Box, etc. However, these systems did not fully support all the features of the Linux OS and were quite heavy, having low compatibility and speed. Virtual machines have completely captured the server configuration market, allowing one to deploy multiple versions of Linux, Windows server, etc. on one physical server. Microsoft's leading software developer has lagged far enough in this area by offering its own Hyper-V hypervisor only in Windows Server 2008. Currently, Microsoft in the new versions of Windows 10 and 11 offered the fastest and most convenient method of integrating Windows and Linux - Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL). This system supports system calls on Linux and allows one to develop full-fledged programs for Linux on the same computer with Windows. In this article, we consistently review the steps of installing WSL in various versions of Windows, offering solutions to the problems that arise, since this task turned out to be quite non-trivial on non-new hardware and not Windows 11. We are considering ways to install the system on various hardware configurations and Windows versions. As a result, we get conclusions about the effectiveness of the chosen approach compared to the VMware virtual machine.