How to use RHEL as a WSL Podman machine

This article from last year details the steps and actions required to build and run your Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) image.

The purpose of this article is to describe the options needed for the RHEL WSL distribution so that it can be used as a Podman machine.

Requirements

To use the RHEL WSL image as a Podman machine, ensure that the following packages are installed:

podman
podman-docker
procps-ng
openssh-server
net-tools
iproute
dhcp-client
sudo
systemd-networkd

Luckily, all but the last package are available from the preconfigured RHEL 9 repositories. The last package (systemd-networkd) is available from the EPEL 9 repository and will need to be configured when building the image.

Build the image

Navigate to image builder (Figure 1).

On the upper right menu, enable the Preview mode (Figure 2).

Figure 2: Image builder welcome page in preview mode.

Click Add blueprint to open the Create image dialog wizard (Figure 3).

Image builder create image page — Figure 3: New image output options page.

On the Image output page, select the following:

From the Release list, select Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 9.
From the Select target environments option, select WSL - Windows Subsystem for Linux (`.tar.gz`).
Click Next.

On the Register page, select Automatically register and enable advanced capabilities.

From the dropdown menu, choose an activation key to use for the image. See Creating an activation key.
Click Next.

On the OpenSCAP page, as it is not supported for WSL images, click Next.

On the File system configuration page, select Recommended: Use automatic partitioning.

Click Next.

On the Content page, complete the following steps to add additional packages to your image:

On the Repository snapshot step:
- Select Use latest content.
- Click Next.
On the Custom repositories step, shown in Figure 4, click the Create and manage repositories here link.

Figure 4: New image custom repositories page.
This will open a new tab (Figure 5).

Figure 5: Repositories management welcome page.

Click Add repositories now (Figure 6).

Console add repositories page — Figure 6: New repositories page.

Click Add repositories (Figure 7).

Console add repository page — Figure 7: New repository options page.

On the Add custom repositories page, select the following:

In the Name list, enter EPEL 9.
In the URL field, enter: https://dl.fedoraproject.org/pub/epel/9/Everything/x86_64/
In the GPG key field, enter: https://dl.fedoraproject.org/pub/epel/RPM-GPG-KEY-EPEL-9
Click Save.

Close the tab and switch back to the previous one.

In the filter input field, type EPEL.
Select the EPEL 9 repository as shown in Figure 8.

Console repository created page — Figure 8: New repository added page.

Click Next.

On the Additional packages step:
- On the Available packages search field, enter podman and click the → button.
- Select the podman and podman-docker packages.
- On the Available packages search field, enter procps-ng and click the → button.
- Select the procps-ng package.
- On the Available packages search field, enter openssh-server and click the → button.
- Select the openssh-server package.
- On the Available packages search field, enter net-tools and click the → button.
- Select the net-tools package.
- On the Available packages search field, enter iproute and click the → button.
- Select the iproute package.
- On the Available packages search field, enter dhcp-client and click the → button.
- Select the dhcp-client package.
- On the Available packages search field, enter sudo and click the → button.
- Select the sudo package and click the > button to add the selected package shown in the package search results to the Chosen packages dual list box.
- On the Available packages search field, enter systemd and click the → button.
- Select the systemd-networkd package.
- Click Next.

On the First boot script configuration page, click Next.

On the Details page:

In the Blueprint name, enter rhel-wsl.
Click Next.

On the Review page:

Click Create blueprint and build image (Figure 9).

Image builder built images page — Figure 9: Image builder images list.

The image is being built. Once the build is finished, the download link will be available. Click the Download (.tar.gz) link and save the downloaded file to one of your local folders.

Create the RHEL WSL Podman machine

Launch Podman Desktop and go to the Settings → Resources page, as shown in Figure 10.

Figure 10: Podman Desktop resources page.

On the Podman provider, click Create new ...

On the Create Podman machine page, click the Browse button for the Image Path field and select the file downloaded from image builder. See Figure 11.

Podman Desktop create Podman machine page — Figure 11: The new Podman machine page in Podman Desktop.

Click the Create button. The machine will be created and started. After a short time, the operation status should be reported, as depicted in Figure 12.