Workshop — Building Secure Dev Environments with Ubuntu on WSL for Cloud, Containers, and DevSecOps

An intermediate, hands-on workshop for developers who use Windows hardware but build and deploy software on Linux servers.

Many aspiring developers in Kenya learn on shared, second-hand, or administratively restricted computers where dual-booting Linux is difficult or impossible. Drawing from my own experience with a BIOS-locked ASUS laptop and community mentorship at KidsCodelab, this workshop presents Ubuntu on WSL as a practical way to remove that barrier.

What we build

We move beyond wsl --install and turn a Windows machine into a secure Linux engineering workstation that closely mirrors a production cloud environment.

• Enable systemd and Ubuntu Pro’s personal tier for Expanded Security Maintenance.
• Run local Kubernetes clusters with Kind.
• Introduce Cilium and eBPF for modern container networking and security.
• Use Hubble to observe network traffic.
• Apply network policies that block unauthorized pod communication at the kernel level.

Duration: 1 hour 45 minutes
Technical level: Intermediate
Workshop repository: ZEZE1020/ubucon-workshop