Windows (WSL Ubuntu)

Windows with Windows Subsystem for Linux as your Infrastructure as Code (IaC) sandbox development environment.

Windows has become an excellent choice for sandbox development with the addition of Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL). You can run complete Linux environments directly on Windows. Visual Studio Code (VS Code), a code editor of choice for many folks, also supports Remote WSL. This extension lets you use the Windows Subsystem for Linux as your full-time development environment from Visual Studio Code!

The official documentation can be found here:

Prerequisites

You must run Windows 10 version 2004 and higher (Build 19041 and higher) or Windows 11. If you're running an older build or just prefer not to use the install command and would like step-by-step directions, see WSL manual installation steps for older versions.

Install

Open up a Windows Command Prompt as the administrator run the following command and restart your computer.

wsl --install

You can uninstall the Linux distribution and start fresh by running:

wsl --unregister Ubuntu; wsl --install -d Ubuntu

Install Windows Terminal by searching the Microsoft Store for "Windows Terminal" or use the following download link.

If you'd like to run the Windows Terminal Preview, you should use the following download link.

Set your default profile and default terminal application in the settings:

Later in the Ubuntu setup, we will install Powerlevel10k, a theme for Zsh that emphasizes speed, flexibility, and out-of-the-box experience.

Installation of the following fonts is recommended:

Nerd Fonts also has some good options. For example, RobotoMono is nice.

Set the font in Windows Terminal settings for the desired profile:

With a complete Linux environment on Windows with Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL). We can access the Linux terminal, develop cross-platform applications, and manage infrastructure without leaving Windows.

Tools Install

To install all the local tools on Ubuntu, please follow the documentation on the following page.

pageUbuntu

Install Visual Studio Code by searching the Microsoft Store for "Visual Studio Code" or use the following download link.

If you'd like to run the insider build of Visual Studio Code, you should use the following download link.

Install Extensions

You can browse for extensions:

  • The Remote - WSL extension lets you use Visual Studio Code on Windows to build Linux applications that run on the WSL. You get all the productivity of Windows while developing with Linux-based tools, runtimes, and utilities.

  • The Datadog extension for VS Code integrates with Datadog to accelerate your development.

  • Dev Containers allows you to open any folder or repository inside a Docker container and use Visual Studio Code's full feature set.

  • The Docker extension makes building, managing, and deploying containerized applications from Visual Studio Code easy.

  • With the GitBook VS Code extension, you can create documentation while you code using your voice.

  • The GitHub Actions extension lets you manage your workflows, view the workflow run history, and helps with authoring workflows.

  • GitHub Codespaces provides cloud-hosted development environments for any activity - whether a long-term project or a short-term task like reviewing a pull request. You can connect to Codespaces from Visual Studio Code or a browser-based editor that's accessible anywhere.

  • GitHub Copilot Chat is a companion extension to GitHub Copilot that houses preview Chat features.

  • GitHub Copilot provides autocomplete-style suggestions from an AI pair programmer as you code. You can receive suggestions from GitHub Copilot either by starting to write the code you want to use or by writing a natural language comment describing what you want the code to do.

  • The GitHub Pull Requests and Issues extension allows you to review and manage GitHub pull requests and issues in Visual Studio Code.

  • The HashiCorp HCL Extension for Visual Studio Code (VS Code) adds syntax highlighting for HCL files.

  • The HashiCorp Terraform extension uses the Terraform Language Server to add syntax highlighting and other editing features to Terraform files.

  • The Infracost extension shows you cost estimates for Terraform right in your editor! Prevent costly infrastructure changes before they get into production.

  • The extension for developers building applications to run in Kubernetes clusters and for DevOps staff troubleshooting Kubernetes applications.

  • The Markdownlint extension provides markdown linting and style checking for Visual Studio Code.

  • The Open Policy Agent extension provides the ability to develop, test, debug, and analyze policies for the Open Policy Agent project.

  • The YAML extension provides comprehensive YAML Language support to Visual Studio Code, via the yaml-language-server, with built-in Kubernetes syntax support.

Settings

Set terminal font family to work with Powerleve10k.

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