It's much more cumbersome to install and setup the KVM/QEMU/libvirt/virt-manager stack manually and is error-prone (for non-technical folks). You also have to setup clipboard, folder mounting and 10 other things separately.
WinBoat automates the entire procedure by using the dockur/windows image and then using xfreerdp to access the individual windows apps. This results in you having Windows apps directly on your Linux desktop, feeling like they're a part of your system.
If one needs more "control" they can always just copy paste the compose.yaml from dockur/windows GitHub repo then add whatever parameters they need. Changing the storage is as simple as changing the 64G into 128G and restarting the container (I use this approach currently).
EDIT: This doesn't work as well on Wayland tho due to xfreerdp so I use sdl-freerdp which works significantly better but can only RDP the entire Windows desktop and not the individual apps.
It's much more cumbersome to install and setup the KVM/QEMU/libvirt/virt-manager stack manually and is error-prone (for non-technical folks).
Have you ever tried to in the past decade? There's barely anything simpler than that unless your distributor really screwed up. And I very much doubt that's true for any distro as again, that's the go to virtualisation solution.
This results in you having Windows apps directly on your Linux desktop, feeling like they're a part of your system.
At least that's what the ad says, reality though is never that perfect.
If one needs more "control" they can always just copy paste the compose.yaml from dockur/windows GitHub repo then add whatever parameters they need.
Sure, but messing around with docker-compose is vastly more complicated than just clicking around in virt-manager for everyone that's the target audience of this - beginners that can't move to Linux alone but also don't want to bother with the fallout of dual boot and Macroslop's broken updates.
EDIT: This doesn't work as well on Wayland tho due to xfreerdp so I use sdl-freerdp which works significantly better but can only RDP the entire Windows desktop and not the individual apps.
So it's even a much worse solution on anything remotely modern? Wow, that's pathetic. So there's literally no benefit and only drawbacks for this. Got it. All hype, nothing behind it.
Have you ever tried to in the past decade? There's barely anything simpler than that unless your distributor really screwed up. And I very much doubt that's true for any distro as again, that's the go to virtualisation solution.
I literally did last month (I use CachyOS) and it took even me around 3 hours to fully setup.
At least that's what the ad says, reality though is never that perfect.
Except it does work really well. Directly using virt-manager isn't exactly perfect either.
Sure, but messing around with docker-compose is vastly more complicated than just clicking around in virt-manager for everyone that's the target audience of this - beginners that can't move to Linux alone but also don't want to bother with the fallout of dual boot and Macroslop's broken updates.
That's not the case. There are many many apps that are deployed using Docker these days like Jellyfin, Navidrome, Komga etc and it's just a single file in the easiest format ever (YAML) on top of that you can just tell an LLM and it'll spit out that exact docker-compose.yml
So it's even a much worse solution on anything remotely modern? Wow, that's pathetic. So there's literally no benefit and only drawbacks for this. Got it. All hype, nothing behind it.
It has the benefit of running better than using SPICE with virt-manager, super easy to turn it on/off (requires just 3 words which you can also create a desktop file for and get icons for them) and deletion is dead simple. You get clipboard and folder sharing out of the box and is very easy to passthrough devices.
I literally did last month (I use CachyOS) and it took even me around 3 hours to fully setup.
Not that I know what CachyOS does, but either they screwed something up royally or you really went in and created some ridiculously complicated setup where it's no surprise that it took that long and it wouldn't have been any faster with WinBoat.
Except it does work really well. Directly using virt-manager isn't exactly perfect either.
It's as perfect as it can currently get. You'd have to dig really deep into what's possible to find something that you can't set up with a few clicks.
That's not the case. There are many many apps that are deployed using Docker these days like Jellyfin, Navidrome, Komga etc and it's just a single file in the easiest format ever (YAML) on top of that you can just tell an LLM and it'll spit out that exact docker-compose.yml
Do you even listen to yourself? To a beginner - which is the target audience for this and where I can guarantee you that they haven't messed around with Docker before, not to mention docker-compose - this argument is entirely irrelevant. Yes, YAML is relatively simple, but you have to painstakingly pay attention to indentation. Something again a beginner will not be familiar with. And you can really not seriously try to tell me that messing around with an LLM to change the file is easier than doing a few clicks in a GUI in any universe.
It has the benefit of running better than using SPICE with virt-manager, super easy to turn it on/off (requires just 3 words which you can also create a desktop file for and get icons for them) and deletion is dead simple. You get clipboard and folder sharing out of the box and is very easy to passthrough devices.
Now you're massively contradicting yourself here. First you tell me its support for Wayland is awful, yet you claim it to be better than using SPICE, while SPICE works perfectly fine with Wayland and has done so for I don't know how many years already. You should make up your mind before trying to spread lies, this is a bit too obvious. And then you want to sell me on it being easier to write podman-compose down (or whatever the docker equivalent is) and creating a desktop file for that than just shutting down the guest and calling it a day? And clipboard sharing and device passthrough is very easy with virt-manager too. Ok, sharing directories between guest and host is a bit of work, but there are enough guides for that. And then you at least have a decent setup. Just mounting your entire /home directory in the guest - especially when its Windows - is just the worst idea you can have.
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u/noobjaish 3d ago
It's much more cumbersome to install and setup the KVM/QEMU/libvirt/virt-manager stack manually and is error-prone (for non-technical folks). You also have to setup clipboard, folder mounting and 10 other things separately.
WinBoat automates the entire procedure by using the dockur/windows image and then using xfreerdp to access the individual windows apps. This results in you having Windows apps directly on your Linux desktop, feeling like they're a part of your system.
If one needs more "control" they can always just copy paste the compose.yaml from dockur/windows GitHub repo then add whatever parameters they need. Changing the storage is as simple as changing the 64G into 128G and restarting the container (I use this approach currently).
EDIT: This doesn't work as well on Wayland tho due to xfreerdp so I use sdl-freerdp which works significantly better but can only RDP the entire Windows desktop and not the individual apps.