Piping to WSL?

May 20, 2008
12,167
133
Syracuse, NY, USA
This works reliably.

Code:
v:\> (do i=100 to 1 by -1 ( echo %i %@repeat[x,36] )) | wsl sort -n | tail /n 5
96 xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
97 xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
98 xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
99 xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
100 xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

If I make the lines 1 character longer it never works correctly, often producing no output at all.

Code:
v:\> (do i=100 to 1 by -1 ( echo %i %@repeat[x,37] )) | wsl sort -n | tail /n 5
94 xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
95 xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
96 xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
97 xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
98 xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

v:\> (do i=100 to 1 by -1 ( echo %i %@repeat[x,37] )) | wsl sort -n | tail /n 5

v:\>
 
May 20, 2008
12,167
133
Syracuse, NY, USA
This seems to depend (in a not very predictable way) on what command follows the last pipe. If I do this, TAIL sees 41 lines of output (occasionally none).

Code:
(do i=100 to 1 by -1 ( echo %i %@repeat[x,97] )) | wsl sort -n | tail

The same is true of HEAD, TPIPE (/head, /tail, /grep), DO x in @con, and Windows's FIND.EXE.

OTOH, these reliably see all 100 lines of output: FINDSTR.EXE, SORT.EXE, LC (a line-count plugin of my own).

And it can be quite erratic.

Code:
d:\tc26\library> (do i=100 to 1 by -1 ( echo %i %@repeat[x,77] )) | wsl sort -n | find /c /v ""
100

d:\tc26\library> (do i=100 to 1 by -1 ( echo %i %@repeat[x,77] )) | wsl sort -n | find /c /v ""
51
 
May 20, 2008
12,167
133
Syracuse, NY, USA
After more experimenting ... it's not piping to wsl, it's piping wsl's output to somethng else ... very unreliable. I get screwy results in CMD too. I doubt TCC can do anything about it.

Fortunately, for my purposes, long sequences of pipes can be done completely in (one) wsl.

Code:
v:\> (do i=100 to 1 by -1 ( echo %i %@repeat[x,40] )) | ( wsl sort -n ^| tail -n 3 )
98 xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
99 xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
100 xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

v:\> (do i=100 to 1 by -1 ( echo %i %@repeat[x,40] )) | ( wsl sort -n ^| tail -n 3 ^| wc -l )
3
 

samintz

Scott Mintz
May 20, 2008
1,555
26
Solon, OH, USA
My guess would be the way console stuff is done for WSL is the issue. There is something special about the way stdin/out/err works in WSL so that things like ssh et. al. work correctly. I vaguely remember reading about that in the "What's new in WSL2" description.
 
Aug 23, 2010
688
9
I would say "you are using WSL wrong". For your purposes, something like Cygwin of UNIX utils for Windows would fit better. Or just do everything in WSL.
 

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