run *.cmd from wsl shell

[oHaiyang]

Microsoft Windows [Version 10.0.18980.1]

The documents say one can Run Windows tools from WSL, if one type notepad.exe into the WSL shell, the Windows application should launch. But what if I want to run a cmd script directly from WSL shell, is that possible?

For some tools like yarn and npm, they do not have yarn.exe or npm.exe, but use a .cmd script as their command interface.

[archilkarchava]

You can make a wrapper bash/zsh/fish/sh script for it. Put cmd.exe /c <yourscript>.cmd inside your script.

[oHaiyang]

Thanks, I will have a try and post the scripts for someone may have same situation.

[therealkenc]

The use case is hard to follow here though. Yep, cmd.exe /c is how you would invoke a .cmd script from WSL, but no Linux npm would ever do that. Conversely once you invoke npm.exe you are off in Windows-land, and anything in the npm.exe process tree after that happens in Windows. The Windows npm.exe will spawn whatever it needs to spawn, which might end up being some .cmd script; but WSL is oblivious.

But whatever the particulars of the use case, @archilkarchava has the canonical answer of how to evoke a .cmd script from WSL.

[Once some time back when someone else asked this question, I had wondered idly if anyone had done a cmd.exe interpreter look-alike in Linux. Never did find one. There is Linux pwsh, which is pretty cool.]

[oHaiyang]

@archilkarchava Thanks again.

end up with a simple shell function that works great for me:

cmd() {
  CMD=$1
  shift;
  ARGS=$@
  WIN_PWD=`wslpath -w "$(pwd)"`
  cmd.exe /c "pushd ${WIN_PWD} && ${CMD} ${ARGS}"
}

then I can simply call cmd yarn in WSL terminal like it's running yarn in Windows environment.

@therealkenc
yes, I want to have the yarn/npm running in Windows-land. I'm using neovim in WSL as the code editor, but running electron in windows as the runtime for my code. Running yarn/npm in Windows-land makes it download pre-built electron binary for Windows but Linux.

[aartek]

@oHaiyang's fish function equivalent to run windows scripts from fish on wsl

function cmd 
    set CMD $argv[1]
    set ARGS $argv[2..-1]
    set WIN_PWD (wslpath -w (pwd))
    echo $WIN_PWD
    cmd.exe /c "pushd $WIN_PWD && $CMD $ARGS"
end