Getting your Windows app running on Linux in a easy way on Ubuntu
Monday, 28. April 2008, 14:27:22
Here is the summary of my talk about WINE at the Ubuntu Hardy Heron release party Berlin. It includes all links and describes the best way getting an app like Photoshop running smooth.0: About WINE and using it
- WINE enables you to run Windows applications on Linux,
- Not all is running well, take a look in the AppDB of WINE about you software first
- WINE is open source and didn't requires Windows or a Windows license
- Don't port your Windows try the native Linux software first
- WINE could bring some security holes of Windows to your Linux desktop
1: Install WINE
- Don't install the WINE package ships with Hardy (see WINE glitches)
- add the WINE reposotories to Synaptic via a terminal with
sudo wget http://wine.budgetdedicated.com/apt/sources.list.d/hardy.list -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/winehq.listor for Gutsy etc.
sudo wget http://wine.budgetdedicated.com/apt/sources.list.d/gutsy.list -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/winehq.list- Or download WINE 0.9.57 or 0.9.60 (please not the versions between see WINE glitches)
http://wine.budgetdedicated.com/archive/
- Don't run any Windows software or WINE or configuring WINE now
2: Install and configure Wine-Doors
- Download the Ubuntu Deb package: http://www.wine-doors.org/wordpress/?page_id=3
- Start Wine-Doors "Applications > WINE > Wine-Doors" and following the "First Start Wizard"
- When you are ready with it install the packages "UbuntuColours" & "Internet Explorer 6"
- after it close Wine-Doors
3: IEs4Linux
- many Windows applications requires the IE6 but the package of Wine-Doors didn't run well
- So install the IE again using the IEs4Linux script
- Web developers using gEdit could tryout my "gEdit Browser Preview" plugin that supports IEs4Linux
4: Get your app installed
- Wine-Doors is simliar to Synaptic, it installs all necessary Windows packages for your Windows applications
- So before you try to install your application, install a demo of that application or a application using the same toolkit first
- Take as an example Photoshop: First install the demo of Photoshop via Wine-Doors, so you can be sure all needed Windows DLL's for your version of Photoshop are installed
- go into your WINE directory at "~/.wine/drive_c/Program Files/" and delete the folder of the demo
- Then do a right click on your Photoshop installation executable (e.g. setup.exe) and let it run with WINE
- After installion you will find Photoshop at "Applications > WINE > Programms ..."
5: Downgrade
- not any version of WINE is sweet and some times a downgrade is usefull
- Download your last well working version at wine.budgetdedicated.com/archive/
- open a terminal and install the well working version with:
sudo dpkg -i wine_*
6: Where is the WINE Windows?
- usually it is located as a hidden directory in your home directory: ".wine/drive_c/windows/"
- the IEs4Linux are located in "~/.ies4linux/"
- your WINE Windows profile is located in ".wine/drive_c/windows/profiles/"
7: Configure WINE
- you can configure WINE itself "Applications > WINE > Configure WINE" or via terminal "winecfg"
- you can assign paths to drive letters
- change the look and feel about the GUI (see my older post "Tweaking WINE"
- setting up Windows versions per app
(63%)
WIDGETIZE
Anonymous # 28. April 2008, 20:59
Thanks for your extensive list!
One thing I was wondering about: as IEs4linux installs IE6 into ~/.ies4linux/ and Wine-Doors into ~/.wine/, do you transfer the IEs4liux installation of IE6 to the other one?
Eckhard M. Jäger # 29. April 2008, 07:47
In Wine-Doors 0.2 IEs4Linux will be included and all would be in one place.
Gabriel # 29. April 2008, 09:29
Luckily I've managed to do a backup of my old .wine folder *phuuu*
I've tried to do the IE6 installation manually (with explanations from appdb), as the wine-doors one crashes, but I wasn't lucky either. So I'll try next time, when I got a little more time on my hands...
Have a nice week,
Gabriel
Eckhard M. Jäger # 29. April 2008, 10:02
Gabriel # 29. April 2008, 11:17
I reinstalled everything from scratch (wine, wine-doors, ubuntu-colors+ie6 through wine-doors). Although the install process worked just fine this time, IE6 did not work at all.
Then I downloaded the demo version of Starmoney6 and installed it into the same wine dir. The good thing about the Starmoney installation process ist: it installs several libraries AND IE6. The Starmoney people made a good job on scripting the process, there's even a subpage at their website:
http://www.starmoney.de/index.php?id=linux
So without installing IEs4Linux I have now an installation of wine with wine-doors, my Starmoney runs just fine and of course a working installation of IE6.
Maybe this is the solution for other people too, even if they do not want to use Starmoney at all.
And now for something completely different...
Anonymous # 8. June 2008, 18:10
Area42: where the hell do you get the notion that IEs4Linux will be in wine-doors 0.2?
You just made that up didn't you... And I'll tell you how I know that. I write wine-doors!
I used IEs4Linux a while back, it was fairly bad for what we wanted in wine-doors so now we have our own package. Which works nicely. Try reading the wine-doors blog before making claims on my behalf.
IE6 has recently been fixed up by Andy Stormont our 0.1.x maintainer. After the upcoming release of 0.1.3 Andy will turn his efforts toward developing 0.2 core functionality along side myself and the 0.1.x series will be finished never to have another point release.
With 0.2 there will be a dramatic change... From that change of code the ecosystem will change also.