Bash environment on Windows: This is not Cygwin

If you are a Linux/UNIX guy and are forced to use Windows then you may find this post useful. Linux/Unix guys use windows due to many reasons. One of the reasons is Microsoft Outlook. This is must have for me and there is no application that can take its place in Enterprise environment.

Today, we will try to setup bash environment of Windows XP. If command prompt is launched then it user should able to change his/her default shell to bash shell and should able to execute generally used Unix tools.

There are few software packages that need to be downloaded.

1. Download bash-203.zip and extract it to “c:\bash”

2. Now download Native Win32 ports of some GNU utilities to “c:\temp\UnxUtils”

Now copy all files from “c:\temp\UnxUtils\usr\local\wbin” to “c:\bash”. It should look like this,

Now add “c:\bash” to global PATH environment variable as below,

On windows, we can also add “HOME” environment variable which will be passed to bash shell.

Once PATH variable includes “c:\bash”, launch Program=>Accessories=>Command Prompt and type in “bash”.

Bash environment is ready on windows. All bash shortcuts will also work as equally as on Linux.

I also know that there could be other ways to get this work done on windows. If you use this or similar technique then let me know your experience in comments below.