Hold on, before we get into Winboat, I wanna ask you some questions, which desktop operating system are you using? Windows or Linux etc? Majority of people use either Windows or Linux as per statistics from reputed sources, so it’s no wonder you may be using Windows or Linux, but the question arise, why did you choose Windows or Linux? You may say i have my own reasons isn’t it? Well everyone do, especially as Windows and Linux have it’s own pros and cons, which is why sticking with one isn’t always ideal, you have to switch between Windows and Linux right?
In sense, in one way or another, there can be a situation where you have to depend on Windows and Linux, then only you may able to handle certain tasks, which is why having both Windows and Linux on your desktop is smart choice, yeah it’s simple to say than done, as steps involved in dual booting Windows and Linux is complex, that require keen attention with geeky level expertise in configuring desktop, in simple it’s not beginner stuff unless you’re very much confident you can do dual booting without breaking anything and can handle if something goes wrong, got it?
Here’s why, I said it’s complex for newbies to dual boot Windows and Linux on one desktop, mainly because it involves custom EFI bootloaders and many other technicals, which is lenghy process and doing any one wrong step will lead to broken and unusable desktop, so before you try to mess with desktop, make sure to backup data else it can lead to personal or financial losses, keep that in mind, if you still want to continue to procedure of real dual booting Windows and Linux, you’re at your own risk, Well wait you may ask, is there no way we can use both Windows and Linux without breaking stuff, yeah by using Virtual Machines.
On Windows, we have several virtual machine softwares like Oracle Virtual Box, Qemu and many more to emulate not just Windows but also Linux operating systems also known as distros, yeah they do require some learning curve in regards to how to setup and configure properly, but once you get used to them, you will be able to boot old and new versions of Windows and Linux distros from your current Windows OS itself without messing with bootloaders and at hardware level, amazing right? Indeed but wait you may say they are for Windows, what if I’m using Linux, yeah I know for Linux also there are many softwares in place.
You use Linux? East or west Linux is not less than Windows in anyway? Isn’t it? There is edge to edge competition between Windows and Linux, at the end we can neither say one is better than other or choose overall winner, nevertheless at the end folks use whichever operating system they like and prefer to use for whatever activities, but one thing is clear, there is always requirement of interchangeability, there will be certain things you get on Linux won’t be available on Windows and vice versa like interms of some softwares and technologies etc, so there will be necessity where you have to use Windows stuff on top of Linux and vice versa, you agree or disagree?
If you agree we must use one’s stuff on another operating system, then we are in line, but if you don’t I still respect your opinion as nothing is impossible, anyhow if you’re using Linux, then as said earlier we do have some virtual machine softwares available for Linux as well to run Windows softwares, out of them we have to pick the right one, don’t you think? Usually majority of you want best virtual machine software for Linux that’s fast, steady and has no bugs here and there, correct? So that you’ll able to do whatever tasks without issues on the go properly.
There are many kinds of virtual machines, some were created to run full operating systems and others are for specific softwares, if you are here for emulation of whole operating system? Ah not this time, as per context of this article we will be focusing on virtual machine that run Windows softwares on Linux, anyway emulation isn’t easy, it requires plenty of work on virtual machine software to make it run whole operating system or specific softwares etc smoothly, it can take months or years based on developer and a lot more stuff to optimize virtual machine software which is why you’ll mostly find unstable ones.
In this context, I mean to say most virtual machine softwares doesn’t run whole Windows operating system or softwares with native level experience, and finding one which offer it is rare especially on Linux distros, but not anymore, we recently got to know about Winboat, a free and open source project licenced under MIT, which states to run full Windows desktop and all softwares with native OS-level experience and has seamless integration with Linux, basically you’re Linux home directory is mounted on Windows so that you can share files without hassle, at present it’s in beta so limited features, but let’s wish for a lot more cool stuff upcoming in future,
At present, Winboat offer 4 variants, AppImage for Linux distros, Unpacked for raw executable files, .Deb for debian, .rpm for fedora and eventually they may offer more, but in order to run Winboat on any Linux distro, you need minimum desktop requirements of 4GB RAM, 2 CPU threads and at least 32 GB of free space, after that make sure KVM is enabled in BIOS | UEFI, once you full-fill prerequisites, you can begin installing Winboat, anyhow it’s important to mention if you recall I’ve said earlier it’s in beta phase, so you may find bugs, yet you still wanna try, be ready to cope with them, in any case don’t forget Winboat is FOSS, so its code is public, and you can check, contribute, and be assured of its privacy and security.
Note: Winboat is an electron app, that offer flexibility, it let you select specifications and preferences for your Windows desktop, and on its own it does automatic installs, so you can stay intact and uptodate, including that if you’re curious, here’s how Winboat give you native level experience, it runs it’s VM in docker container and communicate using Windows guest server for compositing Windows apps as native OS-level experience, it also states to use FreeRDP together with RemoteApp protocol, for more information feel free to check their GitHub, because not all information can be provided here as they change overtime, shall we now explore visual inferface of Winboat? Are you ready? If yes let’s get started.
• How to download Winboat with official support •
– GitHub
• Winboat key features with UI / UX Overview •
– Smartcard
– Passthrough
– Resource Monitoring
– Many more.
Atlast, this are just highlighted features of Winboat, there may be many hidden features in-build that provides you external benefits to give the ultimate usage experience, anyway if you want one of the best VM for Linux to run Windows desktop and it’s apps at native OS-level experience then Winboat is on go worthy choice.
Overall, Winboat has elegant and modern intuitive user interface, that ensures user friendly experience, but in any project there is always space for improvement, so let’s wait and see will Winboat get any major UI changes to provide ultimate usage experience in future and make it even more better as of now, it’s awesome.
Moreover, it is definitely worth to mention Winboat is one of the very few free and open source virtual machine software available for Linux distros to run full Windows desktop and it’s app at OS-level native experience, yes indeed if you’re searching for such app then Winboat has definately has potential to become your new favourite choice.
Finally, This is Winboat, a virtual machine software to run full Windows desktop and softwares with native OS-level experience on Linux distros, it’s a savior for those who want to use Windows on Linux safely without messing up desktop, so do you like it? Are you an existing user of Winboat? If yes do say your experience and mention why you like Winboat over other VMs in our comment section below, see ya 🙂