Upgrade Debian 9, (current WSL) to Debian 12 (bookworm testing)

upgrade-debian-wsl.md

Upgrade Debian 9 (current WSL) to Debian 12 (bookworm testing)

Note: I do not maintain this gist anymore, but people report that it still works. Please check the comments for any revisions or extra things you should take into consideration.

As of writing, the Debian distro for WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux) is quite old.

You can get more up-to-date package managers, text-editors and compilers by upgrading WSL to Debian 12 (current testing).

• Root required
• Use at your own risk, preferably on a fresh installation.
• Choose 'yes' when Debian requests to restart services.

1. Install and open Debian on WSL (if not already)

wsl --install -d debian
wsl -d debian

2. Go into root

sudo -s

3. Upgrade Debian 9 to 10

apt update -y && \
apt upgrade -y && \
echo "deb http://deb.debian.org/debian/ buster main
deb http://deb.debian.org/debian/ buster-updates main
deb http://security.debian.org/debian-security buster/updates main" > /etc/apt/sources.list && \
apt update -y && \
apt upgrade -y && \
apt dist-upgrade -y

4. Upgrade Debian 10 to 11

echo "deb http://deb.debian.org/debian/ bullseye main
deb http://deb.debian.org/debian/ bullseye-updates main" > /etc/apt/sources.list && \
apt update -y && \
apt upgrade -y && \
apt dist-upgrade -y

5. Debian 11 to 12

echo "deb http://deb.debian.org/debian/ bookworm main
deb http://deb.debian.org/debian/ bookworm-updates main" > /etc/apt/sources.list && \
apt update -y && \
apt upgrade -y && \
apt dist-upgrade -y && \
apt autoremove -y && \
exit

worked great, however only in WSL2 mode. When it is WSL1, usrmerge fails. This can be fixed via wsl --set-version Debian 2 After the install you can change it back if you need WSL for some reason (serial ports for example)

You do not need to switch to WSL2. As zhangboyangdescribed the issue here:

wsl --shutdown
wsl -u root
apt upgrade # or apt install usrmerge