WinuxCmd

English | 中文

GNU-style commands for Windows shells, without leaving Windows.

WinuxCmd makes familiar GNU-style commands land cleanly in PowerShell, cmd, and Windows Terminal.

It is built for the very common Windows situation where AI, docs, CI logs, issue comments, or muscle memory hand you Linux-flavored one-liners, but the machine in front of you is still Windows.

Install

WinuxCmd is available on winget:

winget install caomengxuan666.WinuxCmd

If you prefer a zip package, download the latest build from Releases.

WinuxCmd also fits conservative Windows environments that still expose Windows PowerShell 5.1, which makes it a practical choice for many AI sandbox and automation hosts.

Why WinuxCmd

• Native Windows first. No WSL, VM, or shell replacement.
• Built for mixed pipelines where Windows tools and GNU-style filters need to coexist.
• Designed for PowerShell 5.1 hosts, including AI sandboxes such as Codex that may not expose PowerShell 7.

That last point is a real product difference. Microsoft's current Coreutils for Windows README says PowerShell 7.4 or newer is required; WinuxCmd is designed to stay useful in PowerShell 5.1-hosted environments.

What It Feels Like

netstat -ano | grep 8080
tasklist | grep -i chrome
ipconfig | grep -i ipv4
dir /b | grep -E "\.cpp$" | sort | uniq
find . -name "*.cpp" -print0 | xargs -0 grep -n TODO

The point is not to turn Windows into Linux. The point is to make familiar text workflows work where you already are.

Use It Your Way

Prefer WinuxCmd names inside the current PowerShell session:

winux activate
cat README.md
rm old.txt
man ls

Restore the original PowerShell behavior with:

winux deactivate

If you want activation in each interactive PowerShell session, add this after the winux wrapper in $PROFILE:

if (Get-Command winux -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue) {
    winux activate 6>$null
}

Where It Fits

WinuxCmd is a strong fit when:

• AI gives you GNU-style one-liners but your host is Windows.
• You want grep | sort | xargs | find style workflows without opening WSL.
• You need native Windows commands like tasklist, netstat, sc, or ipconfig to flow into familiar text filters.
• Your environment is older or locked down and Windows PowerShell 5.1 is still what you actually get.

Command Coverage

WinuxCmd currently implements 148 commands, including practical coverage across:

• file tools like ls, cp, mv, rm, mkdir, ln, stat, readlink, and realpath
• text tools like cat, grep, sed, sort, uniq, cut, head, tail, and wc
• search tools like find and xargs
• Windows-friendly utilities like ps, lsof, which, tree, hexdump, and strings

Detailed compatibility references live here:

• Command Compatibility Matrix (EN)
• GNU Parity Ledger (EN)
• 命令兼容性矩阵 (ZH)
• GNU 兼容清单 (ZH)

Windows Notes

• Unknown commands fall back through the parent shell, so WinuxCmd complements PowerShell and cmd instead of trying to replace them.
• After winux activate, use man.exe when you want WinuxCmd's manual command directly.
• For interactive cmd use, launching Windows Terminal with %SystemRoot%\System32\cmd.exe /k winuxcmd is safer than a global AutoRun hook.

More

• Contributing Guide (EN)
• Contributing Guide (ZH)
• Build Modes
• Custom Containers and Benchmarks
• Local AI workflow for this repo