WSL1 felt like a useful compatibility layer for running some Linux applications in Windows. It had plenty of warts, but it quickly became my preferred command shell for Windows.
WSL2 is more capable, but it's not Windows anymore. I might as well run a proper Linux VM or dual boot. Better yet, I'd rather run a Windows VM in a bare metal Linux OS. Why even bother with WSL2? What's the value add?
GPU access. Actual graphics use is so so, but essential for doing CUDA/AI stuff
Faster file system access on the Linux side (for Linux compiles etc). Ironically, accessing Windows filesystem is slower than WSL1.
Better Linux compatibility.
Vs a Linux VM:
GPU access!
Easier testing for localhost stuff, Linux ports get autoforwarded to Windows (if your test http server is running in WSL2 at port 8080, you can browse to http://localhost:8080 in your Windows browser)
Easy Windows filesystem interaction. Windows local drives show up in /mnt automatically.
Mix Windows commands with Linux commands. I use this for example to pipe strings.exe, which is UTF-16 aware, with Linux text utils.
I think WSL2 tends to be better at sharing memory (releasing unused memory) with the rest of the system than a dedicated VM.
You can mimic some of this stuff to a degree with a VM, but the built in convenience facetor can't be overlooked, and if you are doing CUDA stuff there isn't a good alternative that I am aware of. You could do PCI passthrough using datacenter class GPUs and Windows Server, but $$$.
> I might as well run a proper Linux VM or dual boot.
Obviously you don't do the thing you're writing about. A "proper" Linux VM would incur more work for you and would be less useful. Dual boot would remove your ability to use the computer for activities that need a Windows OS. Running a Windows VM on Linux would take you down a rabbit hole of pain and annoyances, unless your use case for Windows is extremely limited.
I concur. This was my main experience with WSL1 vs. WSL2.
If I'm running Windows, it means that the files and projects that I care about are on the Windows file system. And they need to be there, because my IDE and other GUI apps needs files to be on a real file system to work optimally. (A network share to a WSL2 file system would not let the IDE watch for changes, for instance.)
WSL1 was a great way to get a UNIX-style command line, with git, bash, latex etc., for the Windows file system. WSL2 was just too slow for this purpose; commands like "git status" would take multiple seconds on a large codebase.
Now I switched back to MacOS, and the proper UNIX terminal is a great advantage.
WSL2 is more capable, but it's not Windows anymore. I might as well run a proper Linux VM or dual boot. Better yet, I'd rather run a Windows VM in a bare metal Linux OS. Why even bother with WSL2? What's the value add?