Show HN: WinPodX – run Windows apps on Linux, VM looks like real hardware

WinPodX, a new open-source tool, lets Linux users run Windows applications in native Linux windows by automatically provisioning a KVM-backed Windows container with FreeRDP RemoteApp, achieving real Windows compatibility without a full desktop VM.

Click an app. Word opens. That's it. Native Linux windows for every Windows app — real icons, real WM CLASS , pin-to-taskbar. FreeRDP RemoteApp + dockur/windows. Zero config. How it works No manual VM wrangling. WinPodX provisions everything on the first app click. Install & setup One command pulls a Windows container dockur/windows https://github.com/dockur/windows in rootless Podman, runs an unattended Windows install, and applies the RemoteApp + agent setup. Apps auto-discovered First boot scans the guest — Registry App Paths, Start Menu, UWP/MSIX, Chocolatey, Scoop — and registers every app with its real icon as a Linux .desktop entry. Click & launch Click the app like any native one. It opens in its own Linux window via FreeRDP RemoteApp — pinnable, alt-tabbable, file-associated. No full desktop. Why not just RDP, a VM, or Wine? WinPodX keeps real Windows compatibility while feeling native. | WinPodX | Full-screen RDP | Bare VM | Wine | | |---|---|---|---|---| | Per-app native windows | ✓ | desktop only | desktop only | ✓ | | Real Windows compatibility | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | partial | | Taskbar icons + file assoc. | ✓ | ✕ | ✕ | limited | | One-command setup | ✓ | manual | manual | per-app | | Linux apps in Windows menu | ✓ | ✕ | ✕ | ✕ | What it does Each Windows app becomes its own Linux window — pinnable, alt-tabbable, file-associated, both directions. Seamless app windows - RemoteApp RAIL renders each app as a native window — no desktop - Per-app taskbar icons via WM CLASS matching - Double-click .docx → Word opens; open a second file and it lands in the already-running app - Multi-session RDP: up to 25 independent sessions - Multi-monitor RAIL by default — drag a window to a second screen, keep working Reverse-open - Linux apps appear in the Windows "Open with…" menu, by default - Correct per-app icons in both Windows chooser dialogs - Round-trips the file open back to host xdg-open - Auto-discovers host apps + MIME from freedesktop standards Zero-config launch - First click auto-provisions config, container, desktop entries - First-boot discovery registers every app with its real icon - Registry App Paths, Start Menu, UWP/MSIX, Chocolatey, Scoop - Backends: Podman default , Docker, manual RDP Peripherals & sharing - Clipboard text + images , sound, printers — on by default - Home directory shared as \\tsclient\home - USB drives auto-mapped; live USB device passthrough - Smart DPI scaling auto-detected from your desktop Automation & resilience - Auto suspend / resume; optional pod auto-start on login - Self-heals a stalled RDP guest UNRESPONSIVE → recover - Password auto-rotation; Windows disk auto-grow - Health checks + auto-fix via winpodx doctor --fix Lean & private - Near-zero Python deps — stdlib only on 3.11+ - No telemetry, ever - Multilingual UI en / ko / zh / ja / de / fr / it - Start-menu-style Qt6 GUI with a live Dashboard + a lightweight system tray Works on One-line install across the major Linux families. Needs hardware virtualization. WinPodX runs Windows in a KVM-backed container — an x86 64 / aarch64 CPU with virtualization extensions, 8 GB+ RAM 12 GB+ recommended , and ~30 GB free disk. First install takes ~5–10 minutes Windows ISO download + Sysprep + OEM apply . Full requirements → get-started.html