How to setup Nextflow on windows environment?

Hello everyone,

As to start making Nextflow pipelines I have to first setup the coding platform and then I can use Seqera platforms. I really need help with this situation.

Situation:
I’m encountering an issue while using Nextflow on Windows 11. I successfully installed it through the WSL environment, and when I run the command “Nextflow info” in the terminal, it works fine. However, when I try to execute the “hello” command, I keep receiving the error message: “unknown signal: HUP.” Additionally, when I attempt to run the code in Visual Studio Code using “hello.nf,” it prompts me to select an application to open Nextflow, and I chose Java, but it still doesn’t work. I’m unable to run the code. Can someone assist me with this?

I have tried:

Java works in WSL (java -version shows Java 23), but in PowerShell, it says ‘java’ is not recognized, so it’s not set up properly in Windows.
Nextflow runs in WSL (which nextflow shows /usr/local/bin/nextflow), but in PowerShell, running C:\Users\utkar\nextflow -version gives “No such file or directory”.
Tried nohup nextflow run hello &, but still got the HUP error.
Exported NXF_EXECUTOR=local, added it to ~/.bashrc AND ~/.zshrc, sourced them—no change.
Running java -jar C:\Users\utkar\nextflow.jar gives “Unable to access jarfile”, even though the file exists.
I have two files—one in C:\Users.local\bin\Next flow and another in C:\Users.nextflow. Could that be an issue?

but still getting the “Unknown signal: HUP” error.

Hi @GN-lab , Nextflow does not support Windows natively. WSL is the only way to run Nextflow on Windows. Even though Nextflow is a Java app, Nextflow also relies on Bash scripts.

You might be able to run it through MinGW? No guarantees though

Hey Ben,

Thanks for the response. I have reckoned that it doesn’t work on windows. However, it worked! I had to set everything up again on the WSL system because using MINGW (ConEmu) was still downloading on the Windows server, which caused a HUP signal error. I then used the Ubuntu WSL terminal with root access, downloaded Java 17.0 and Nextflow again, and now it is running smoothly. This was my first time doing all these things, but it worked!

Thanks,
Gaurav.

Glad to hear it. I was going to recommend WSL anyway. I also run Nextflow on WSL and it workflows perfectly fine.

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