windows executable cannot find file under wsl path

Question

I am running WSL1. I created a file in my home dir, ie home/username. I have a .exe file called armcc.exe in my C:\ directory. I can run something like this from the linux shell:

/mnt/c/armcc.exe /mnt/c/test/foo.c

However if I create a file under /home/username, the executable is not able to access the file, ie this command fails:

/mnt/c/armcc.exe /home/username/foo.c

I get an error "no source": Error: #5: cannot open source input file from the compiler's executable.

This seems like the Windows filesystem cannot access the Linux side. How can I achieve this, if at all?

Answer 1

Regular Windows programs use the Win32 subsystem and as a result don't handle Unix paths, only Windows paths. When you use a path to a Windows file system, it gets translated into a Windows path.

There are ways to specify file paths under WSL, using the \\wsl$ prefix. You will likely need to use such a path for a Windows program using this Windows syntax. However, not all Windows programs gracefully handle this path syntax, and some very much want a standard path with a drive letter, so it may not be possible to use this syntax with all programs.