VcXsrv
More info
- Creator
- Marc Haesen
- Released
- Type
- X server
- Predecessor
- Xming
- Source
- github.com/marchaesen/vcxsrv
A free X server for Windows built straight from the X.Org code with Visual C++, which took over from Xming and was how you ran graphical Linux programs in WSL until Windows got WSLg.
In 2009 Marc Haesen started compiling the X.Org server with Microsoft's Visual C++ instead of MinGW, hence the name, and posted the builds on SourceForge. Where Xming had frozen at a 2007 release behind a donation wall, VcXsrv tracked the X.Org releases, came in 64-bit builds and bundled Mesa for OpenGL. The XLaunch starter offered the same choices as Xming's: multiple windows mixed in with Windows' own, one big window holding the whole X desktop, or full screen, plus XDMCP login against a Unix host.
The breakthrough came with WSL. Neither WSL 1 (2016) nor WSL 2 had any graphics support, so anyone wanting to run a Linux editor from their distribution pointed DISPLAY at the Windows side and let VcXsrv receive it. In WSL 2 that went over a virtual network, which in practice meant disabling access control with -ac, and anyone without their firewall in order then had an X server open to the whole network. WSLg in Windows 11 (2021) made the detour unnecessary with a built-in Wayland and X server, and VcXsrv went back to the niche it shared with Xming, Cygwin/X and Exceed: a real Unix machine at the other end. After a few quiet years, releases resumed on GitHub in 2024.