SOFA builds and runs on Windows Subsystem for Linux (yay!)

[max]

Dear all,

Some of you Windows 10 users will be pleased to know that as of Insider Build 14361 [1], SOFA builds and (so far) runs fine on the Windows Subsystem for Linux [2] using XMing [3] as an X server.

This means you can run the SOFA **binaries** compiled on Ubuntu Trusty directly on Windows through the WSL. Yes.

For it to work, you need to:
– enable WSL as described in [2]
– start Bash and compile SOFA just like you would do it on Ubuntu
– start the XMing X server
– export the DISPLAY=:0 environment variable, for instance in your ~/.bashrc
– run SOFA and enjoy!

Of course at this point, WSL is pre-release software and GUI applications where never meant to be supported, but hey, it works 🙂 Performance might not be on par with regular Windows builds, but so far it seems reasonable.

If running Insider Builds is not an option, you might want to wait for the upcoming Windows 10 “Anniversary Update” (which will include WSL) or build/run SOFA for windows the regular way.

[1] https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2016/06/08/announcing-windows-10-insider-preview-build-14361/
[2] https://msdn.microsoft.com/commandline/wsl/about
[3] http://www.straightrunning.com/XmingNotes/

[Hugo]

Thank you very much Max for sharing this !!
Very nice work. Cheers,

Hugo

[Author]

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