What does desktop 4.36 do for wsl2

Docker Desktop
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Hello, since the release of 4.36 i saw this announcement for wsl2 improvements:

Streamlining data workflow with WSL 2 mono distribution

Simplify the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL 2) setup by eliminating the need to maintain two separate Docker Desktop WSL distributions. This update streamlines the WSL 2 configuration by consolidating the previously required dual Docker Desktop WSL distributions into a single distribution, now available on both macOS and Windows operating systems.

The simplification of Docker Desktop’s WSL 2 setup is designed to make the codebase easier to understand and maintain. This enhances the ability to handle failures more effectively and increases the startup speed of Docker Desktop on WSL 2, allowing users to begin their work more quickly.

The value of streamlining data workflows and relocating data to a different drive on macOS and Windows with the WSL 2 backend in Docker Desktop encompasses these key areas:

  • Improved performance: By separating data and system files, I/O contention between system operations and data operations is reduced, leading to faster access and processing.
  • Enhanced storage management: Separating data from the main system drives allows for more efficient use of space.
  • Increased flexibility with cross-platform compatibility: Ensuring consistent data workflows across different operating systems (macOS and Windows), especially when using Docker Desktop with WSL 2.
  • Enhanced Docker performance: Docker performs better when processing data on a drive optimized for such tasks, reducing latency and improving container performance.

By implementing these practices, organizations can achieve more efficient, flexible, and high-performing data workflows, leveraging Docker Desktop’s capabilities on both macOS and Windows platforms.

It is unclear for me what this actually means. The separation already happend from release 4.30 for windows. Is this just announcing it is also available for mac now? Or is this phase 2?

Phase 2: We plan to introduce data migration in a future update, further enhancing the system’s efficiency and user experience. This upcoming phase will ensure that existing users also benefit from these improvements without any hassle.

Does anybody have any actual numbers of this performance increase? Or is this more theoretical?

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According to the release notes:

  • Existing Docker Desktop installations using the WSL2 engine on Windows are now automatically migrated to a unified single-distribution architecture for enhanced consistency and performance.

That explains why I saw the data wsl distribution when others didn’t have it. But at some point I had to reinstall it before v4.36

So this is probably Phase 2 as you suspected.

Regarding the numbers, I don’t think that there are any. The fact that you have two separate disks just allows you to add a new disk to your machine and move the virtual disks to a better, faster physical disk and in theory, you could move only the data disk. I say “in theory”, because I haven’t tried to relocate the disk image on any platform in Docker Desktop an I’m not sure which one would be moved.

So as I understand it, Docker Desktop itself doesn’t give you better Docker performance, it just makes it possible.

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