Howdy, Ubuntu on Windows! Write and Execute Your First Program

Microsoft’s addition of the Bash shell and Ubuntu user space in windows 10 is a real win for developers working in dynamic, interpreted programming languages everywhere. Dozens of dynamic script interpreters are now immediately available on Windows desktops.

In this article, we’re going to write the classic “hello world” application in several different dynamically executed languages, install any necessary dependencies, and execute our interpreted code.

If you’d like to follow along this article and try out these examples, you can grab all of the source code from Git:

$ sudo apt update

$ sudo apt install -y git

$ git clone https://github.com/dustinkirkland/howdy-windows.git

$ cd howdy-windows

Now, let’s look at each language:

Bash

Installation

None, bash is always installed in the default image, but just in case...

sudo apt install -y bash

Code: bash/howdy.sh

#!/bin/sh

echo " ====> Shell: Howdy, Windows!”

Compilation

None, bash is an interpreted language

Execution

$ chmod +x ./bash/howdy.sh

$ ./bash/howdy.sh

====> Shell: Howdy, Windows!

python

Installation

None, python is always installed in the default image, but just in case…

$ sudo apt install -y python

Code: python/howdy.py

#!/usr/bin/python

print(" ====> Python: Howdy, Windows!")

Compilation

None, python is an interpreted language

Execution

$ chmod +x ./python/howdy.py

$ ./python/howdy.py

====> Python: Howdy, Windows!

Perl

Installation

$ sudo apt install -y perl

Code: perl/howdy.pl

#!/usr/bin/perl

print(" ====> Perl: Howdy, Windows!\n");

Compilation

None, Perl is an interpreted language

Execution

$ chmod +x ./perl/howdy.pl

$ ./perl/howdy.pl

====> Perl: Howdy, Windows!

Ruby

Installation

$ sudo apt install -y ruby

Code: ruby/howdy.rb

#!/usr/bin/ruby

puts " ====> Ruby: Howdy, Windows!"

Compilation

None, Ruby is an interpreted language

Execution

$ chmod +x ./ruby/howdy.rb

$ ./ruby/howdy.rb

====> Ruby: Howdy, Windows!

php

Installation

$ sudo apt install -y php5-cli

Code: php/howdy.php

#!/usr/bin/php

<?php

print(" ===> PHP: Howdy, Windows!\n")

?>

Compilation

None, PHP is an interpreted language

Execution

$ chmod +x ./php/howdy.php

$ ./php/howdy.php

===> PHP: Howdy, Windows!

Node.js

Installation

$ sudo apt install -y nodejs

Code: nodejs/howdy.js

console.log(' ====> NodeJS: Howdy, Windows!');

Compilation

None, Node.js is an interpreted language

Execution

$