Create a consistent Windows experience

[ehazlett]

The current Windows experience with Machine is sub-par from its Mac/Linux counterpart. This will bring it up to be consistent. This includes getting Machine running as well as logging and output formatting consistency.

• Use Powershell for Machine interaction (shell selection for env #1033)
• Cleanup logging (ascii chars in output)
• Remove dependency on external apps if possible (i.e. ssh, bash)

[ahmetb]

👍 following this

[znmeb]

A point and click interface for Client Hyper-V is pretty high on my wishlist for Windows. Maybe that belongs under Boot2Docker?

[ahmetb]

@znmeb care to explain more? What is that?

[znmeb]

@ahmetalpbalkan Boot2Docker is a one-click installer. It installs Git for Windows and VirtualBox, then creates a virtual machine running the Boot2Docker ISO. What I'm looking for is something that does the same thing but creates the virtual machine in Windows 8.1 Professional's Client Hyper-V native virtualizer.

The pieces are there - Docker Machine can create Hyper-V machines running Boot2Docker and the Boot2Docker installer can do the same thing with VirtualBox.

[garthk]

Isn't the idea to replace the boot2docker command line (not VM) with docker machine once the latter hits parity?

If so: this is the right repo, @znmeb, but you might want your own issue for

• making a separate installer available without VirtualBox and
• using --driver= hyper-v by default if it's available

… as neither are a matter of bringing the Windows experience of docker machine up to parity with Linux and OS X.

[ehazlett]

@garthk yes the idea is to replace the boot2docker CLI tool with machine.

@znmeb there are plans to update the current installer mechanism to include machine etc similar to b2d. we haven't ironed out exactly what that looks like but will have one when machine enters non-beta.

[znmeb]

Sounds good to me - I'm chomping at the bit to test something. ;-) I just wish I knew PowerShell and open source Windows installer tooling well enough to build something myself.

[ehazlett]

@znmeb i know almost nothing about the installer :) however, here is the source in case you want to check it out: https://github.com/boot2docker/windows-installer

[ehazlett]

@znmeb and fyi, i'm not sure exactly which direction we will go (we may have a completely different install system altogether) -- however, that should get you what you need for the interim

[znmeb]

@ehazlett Thanks - I have no preconceived notions about installers except that there has to be one. ;-) Pretty much all open source installers force the user to page through half a dozen or so option screens and license acceptance pages, which I think reeks.

I counted something like 70 such stop points for my previous Windows release - that's unacceptable and I moved to Docker for my own sanity in setting up a Windows laptop.

[ehazlett]

Closing as the child tasks are compete. If you would like to see a specific improvement added please open a new issue. Thanks!

[ahmetb]

@ehazlett never had a chance to try the new code, what's the status of ANSI emulation integration of the ssh code for cmd.exe/powershell?

[ehazlett]

@ahmetalpbalkan i don't think we've done anything there. we did refactor the logging so there are no longer color codes sent which solves our specific ansi display issue. I think long term we want to move to what you did in the CLI.