There is a new kid in town when it comes to “doing Linux under Windows”. Up to now there was primarily Cygwin and MinGW. But for a while now Microsoft offers the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL). I personally think the name should be the other way around (LSW) but what do I know.

To enable WSL under Windows 10 you first need to enable the required feature.
1. From the start menu go to “Apps and Features”
2. Scroll to the bottom and select “Programs and Features”
3. Click “Turn Windows features on or off” on the left side.
4. Set the check mark on “Windows Subsystem for Linux”
5. Finally a reboot is required for the changes to take effect.

That’s it. Almost. Now we need to install a Linux distribution to run. WSL only brings the environment for Linux to “run on” Windows 10, but there is no default distro included.
The easiest way is to go the App Store and install one of the available distros, like Ubuntu 18.04.
Alternatively you can download the required .appx package and install it manually using the PowerShell (Administrator permissions required) with
Add-AppPackage <filename&gt;.appx

Let’s see when Windows will completely adopt the Linux Kernel.