Cygwin alternate for windows?

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I would like to have some of the most frequent commands which I use in Linux environment in my windows box , I know there is program called Cygwin. But I don't want to use such a heavy one . All I want is a simple ported unix commands for windows.

Is there any Utilities like that ?

PS: I've created my own 'clear' command through clear.bat with 'cls' in it and I can't do it for all commands :)

ukanth

Posted 2009-09-11T13:43:01.703

Reputation: 9 930

Question was closed 2014-05-18T15:47:10.477

Answers

14

Here's a few alternatives:

Out of those, perhaps UnixUtils might serve you best.

jweede

Posted 2009-09-11T13:43:01.703

Reputation: 6 325

@dthree: Please don't sneak in spam by editing questions and adding a link to your own product. The OP of this highly upvoted and accepted answer did not recommend your product and you did not disclose your connection to it. – fixer1234 – 2016-03-11T09:00:28.923

1Superuser doesn't list that when I posted this! Anyhow UnxUtils serves it :) – ukanth – 2009-09-11T13:52:03.717

Sweet. I think that I'll start using that too. – D'Arvit – 2009-09-11T14:12:56.397

The linked question has now been deleted, thanks SuperUser mods. – James McMahon – 2012-05-25T05:19:09.430

7

MSYS - http://www.mingw.org/wiki/msys

Quite usable, and as long as you have the "bin" directory of MSYS in %PATH%, you can use many of the unix commands from within cmd.exe.

You can even quickly switch to bash from within cmd.exe when you need to.

Shawn Chin

Posted 2009-09-11T13:43:01.703

Reputation: 1 174

1Cygwin allows you to use UNIX commands from within cmd.exe when you have the "bin" directory in PATH – jweede – 2009-09-11T14:09:34.653

1MSYS works really well for porting Unix software into Windows. Many times a ./configure and a make is all you need to build it Windows. You also won't need that crazy Cygwin .dll to distribute with the .exe's you build. I highly recommend MSYS. – User1 – 2009-10-27T20:41:58.883

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MicTech

Posted 2009-09-11T13:43:01.703

Reputation: 9 888

3

A few people have suggested UnixUtils, but it doesn't seem to have been updated in several years.

GnuWin32 seems to be under more active development. Its auto-updater, GetGnuWin32, is relatively clunky, but you should be able to deal with it if you're comfortable enough with the CLI to want Linux command-line tools in the first place.

Ed Brannin

Posted 2009-09-11T13:43:01.703

Reputation: 243

1

Actually, if you install the windows version of git it comes with BASH, grep, and a bunch of other basic unix utils. It has to since git is built on those command-line tools. Easiest way to get a basic bash shell that I know of.

Ryan

Posted 2009-09-11T13:43:01.703

Reputation: 1 728

2Actually, it comes with a subset of MSYS from MinGW. – user1686 – 2009-09-11T15:12:37.213

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An excellent option is UWIN from David Korn at AT&T. It is free and it is regularly updated.

fpmurphy

Posted 2009-09-11T13:43:01.703

Reputation: 1 260

0

I have use both Cygwin and various iterations of Inerix/SFU/SUA as well as CMD + unxutils and putty, etc. It always feels like fighting the system.

I have really been won over by powershell (despite the name). I now just use powershell with some unixy aliases, a handful of scripts to emulate unixy behaviors and a few native windows ports like vim, infozip, ncftp, curl, wget, etc.

It kind of depends on what you are trying to do. If you want windows to actually be unix then nothing will feel quite right and it will be various flavors of frustrating. If you want to port software then there are lots of options with various pros and cons. If what you want is a powerful text-mode shell and scriping environment where you have a hope of replicating your automations onto servers or your buddies machines then take a hard look at powershell.

Brian Reiter

Posted 2009-09-11T13:43:01.703

Reputation: 706