Results 1 to 3 of 3

Thread: Windows Administration/Customization

  1. #1
    Join Date
    Dec 2006
    Location
    Banville
    Posts
    3,914
    Mentioned
    12 Post(s)
    Quoted
    98 Post(s)

    Default Windows Administration/Customization

    Does anyone have any recommended programs? I find myself interacting with an increasing number of Windows machines and there's a growing list of programs I want but can't easily use. I don't exactly know what to ask for because most of my knowledge doesn't translate well to Windows. If possible I would like suggestions to be open source.

    What I tend to use right now:

    What is missing:
    • A bunch of command line programs that don't make sense even with Cygwin (e.g. they manage resources that Windows controls, or interact with X11);
    • program(s) to gather process and hardware statistics like "ps" or "htop;"
    • program(s) to display that information in an interactive fashion (I know of https://www.rainmeter.net/, let me know if there are others);
    • program(s) to manage windows on the desktop with hotkeys, like a tiling window manager;
    • LVM and software RAID;
    • automatic deployment and installation;
    • a Bash-like shell (with features like tab completion) that is better integrated with the OS; and
    • a lot of the virtual machine functionality that QEMU offers. Some of it is available via Hyper-V (e.g. GPU passthrough) but Hyper-V is very hard to use from its GUI. There are apparently PowerShell bindings, but I was never able to find documentation for them.


    Again, the above is me trying to fit Windows into the mold of Linux. If there's better programs or things I haven't thought of I would like those things to be suggested as well.

    There's some things I want to do - like automatically set up Windows VM images - that seems like it can only be done with Microsoft tools. I technically know the solution but want to know anything you might be able to add about actually using those things, because I never really figured them out well.
    Last edited by R0b0t1; 06-22-2017 at 07:34 AM.
    The jealous temper of mankind, ever more disposed to censure than
    to praise the work of others, has constantly made the pursuit of new
    methods and systems no less perilous than the search after unknown
    lands and seas.

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Feb 2011
    Location
    The Future.
    Posts
    5,600
    Mentioned
    396 Post(s)
    Quoted
    1598 Post(s)

    Default

    MSYS2 with Git is one of the best shells. Github uses it.
    I am Ggzz..
    Hackintosher

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Dec 2006
    Location
    Banville
    Posts
    3,914
    Mentioned
    12 Post(s)
    Quoted
    98 Post(s)

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by Brandon View Post
    MSYS2 with Git is one of the best shells. Github uses it.
    So it looks like MSYS2 is a repackaged Cygwin unless I misunderstood something. I really like MinTTY (the terminal packaged with Cygwin and presumably MSYS2) it's just it doesn't integrate very well with the rest of the OS the way PowerShell does. As in - a lot of Cygwin/MSYS2 programs only interact with programs run with Cygwin/MSYS2, and it's hard to access information about the OS via their utilities.

    I might not ever be able to get what I want unfortunately. PowerShell can do some awesome things but the interface (the PowerShell prompt, though I still need to try PowerShell ISE) is lacking. I might be better off going for C#.

    I do like that MSYS2 has a package manager inside of itself unlike Cygwin.
    The jealous temper of mankind, ever more disposed to censure than
    to praise the work of others, has constantly made the pursuit of new
    methods and systems no less perilous than the search after unknown
    lands and seas.

Thread Information

Users Browsing this Thread

There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •