New deep dive video explores Windows Subsystem for Linux's Project Astoria roots

The Windows Subsystem for Linux has a long history on Windows 10. With version 2004 that's coming next month, WSL 2 is going to be introduced, and for the first time, the OS is going to ship with a full Linux kernel. In a video called WSL Deep Dive and Q&A, which was published by celebrateubuntu and spotted by WalkingCat, Microsoft's Ben Hillis and Craig Loewen explore WSL in detail.

If you're interested in the Windows Subsystem for Linux, this might be worth a watch. As many already know, Windows 10 was supposed to ship with various "bridges" to bring apps from other platforms to what was then called the Windows Store. For example, Project Centennial was for packaging Win32 apps, Project Westminster was for hosted web apps, Project Islandwood was for recompiling iOS apps as Windows 10 apps, and then there was Project Astoria, for running Android apps on Windows 10.

Unlike Islandwood, the Android bridge was just running an app in an Android subsystem, rather than recompiling it to run natively. This was the first step toward the Windows Subsystem for Linux.

Another interesting tidbit is how it was named. The team was told that if you're going to name a product, you have to be able to own that name. It was originally going to be called Linux on Windows, but that's how the Windows Subsystem for Linux name was born.