initial setup

To install WSL on a windows machine, use Debian, and use WSL2:

# 

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/wsl/install



# install (ubuntu by default)
wsl --install 

# specify a distro to install 
wsl --install -d Debian
# reboot here

# list all
wsl -l -v

# set default wsl version for all instances
wsl --set-default-version 2

# set the default wsl version
wsl --setdefault Debian

# remove the ubuntu install 
wsl --terminate Ubuntu
wsl --unregister Ubuntu
wsl -l -v

install hyper-v manager and create a v-switch first 

:




next edit the `/etc/wsl.conf` file to enable systemd and some other WSL stuff:


# Set a command to run when a new WSL instance launches.
[boot]
systemd=true

# Set whether WSL supports interop process like launching Windows apps and adding path variables. Setting these to false will block the launch of Windows processes and block adding $PATH environment variables.
[interop]
appendWindowsPath=true

# Automatically mount Windows drive when the distribution is launched
[automount]

# Set to true will automount fixed drives (C:/ or D:/) with DrvFs under the root directory set above. Set to false means drives won't be mounted automatically, but need to be mounted manually or with fstab.
enabled = true

reboot wsl with `wsl --shutdown` and relaunch

`systemctl --user status` will return 
"Failed to connect to bus: No such file or directory"

to fix this (https://medium.com/@avivarmaformal/setting-up-debian-on-wsl2-with-systemd-fb4831dd7b82)



# this should show inactive/failed
sudo service systemd-logind status


sudo apt -y update
sudo apt -y upgrade

sudo apt -y install dbus-user-session
sudo apt -y install --reinstall libpam-systemd

# restart systemd-logind and check status, should be running 
sudo service systemd-logind start
sudo service systemd-logind status

# fixing other errors like shutdown not working
sudo apt -y install --reinstall dbus

# reboot wsl here and make sure dbus is running
sudo systemctl status dbus

# fixing an issue with running VSCode from the terminal 


sudo apt -y install binfmt-support

sudo echo ':WSLInterop:M::MZ::/init:PF' > /usr/lib/binfmt.d/WSLInterop.conf
sudo systemctl restart systemd-binfmt
sudo systemctl restart binfmt-support

# look for WSLInterop here
sudo ls -Fal /proc/sys/fs/binfmt_misc/

# check for enabled here:
sudo cat /proc/sys/fs/binfmt_misc/WSLInterop

 

check https://github.com/microsoft/WSL/issues/9360 for issues with path append and interop