keepwsl

A simple service to keep WSL alive

Requirements

• Installation of WSL2 with a Linux distribution (e.g., Debian, Ubuntu, etc.)
• Copy of this repository to your local machine

Installation

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1. Opening the terminal

• Open the terminal with the target wsl distro, in the example we use Debian, you can replace it with your distro.

wsl --distribution Debian

2. Changing the wsl.conf file

• Change the wsl.conf file inside wsl to enable systemd and automount.
  • For example we use nano editor, you can use any editor you prefer.

sudo nano /etc/wsl.conf

• Change the content to the following

/etc/wsl.conf

[boot]
systemd=true

[automount]
enabled = true

• Use control + X to exit,
  • the editor will ask you if you want to save the file: press Y to save the changes.
  • the editor will ask you the filename, press Enter to confirm the filename.

3. Installing the service

• Change the path path-to-service-file to the path of the service file Then run the following commands to install the service:

sudo cp /mnt/path-to-service-file/keepwsl.service /etc/systemd/system/keepwsl.service
sudo systemctl enable --now keepwsl

• You can now leave the terminal by closing it or type exit. After that confirm that it keeps running by checking the status of wsl to confirm it is running:

wsl -l -v

The STATE should be "Running"

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