andLinux For Windows
Before virtualization, if you wanted to to simulate a Linux environment on a Windows desktop you would use Cygwin or MKS. I’ve been using Cygwin for a long time now but recently I been tinkering with different Linux images (OpenSUSE, Ubuntu) with VMWare. Now there is a third option, in addition to emulation and virtualization you can run Linux natively in Windows with andLinux.
andLinux is a Ubuntu distribution running as a native Windows application. andLinux uses coLinux which is a port of the Linux kernel to Windows. Basically they cross-platformed Linux. andLinux is still in the beta and the installation feels a bit rough around the edges. But once installed you can run KDE applications such as Konsole, KWord, KPresenter, and Konqueror amongst others.
Even though andLinux is in beta and I have not figured out completely how to access Windows’ disk drive and other resources, it is download worthy.
It used to be that to cross platform a software application you spend time porting it, then with virtual machines you write once and run anywhere the VM is running, but now with andLinux the whole Linux Operating System was crossed platformed to Windows.
A similar movement is also happening where Windows application such as Photoshop or Office are made to run as native applications in Linux. The Wine project allows you to run Word, Photoshop and other of your favorite Windows application in Linux. Wine is an implementation of the Windows API on top of X, OpenGL, and Unix.
Technorati Tags: linux, colinux, andlinux, windows, cross platform, virtualization