KNoW-HoW Wine Running Windows programs on Ubuntu with Wine Wine importer Shanna Korby, Fotolia Korby, Shanna Users who move from Windows to Ubuntu often miss some of their favorite programs and games. Wouldn’t it be practical to run Windows applications on the free Ubuntu operating system? Time for a little taste of Wine. BY TIM SCHÜRMANN any Ubuntu migrants miss to develop something similar for Linux. Box or VMware, Wine does not emulate games and graphics programs A short while later, the first version of a whole PC and thus cannot be consid- Msuch as CorelDRAW or prod- Wine was released. Today, more than ered a real emulator. This also explains ucts such as Adobe Photoshop. The only 300 volunteer programmers from all over the name Wine, which means Wine Is solution is to install Windows parallel to the world continue to contribute to the Not an Emulator. Ubuntu – or try Wine, which tricks ap- Wine project. Because of the way Wine works, it of- plications into believing they are run- fers a number of advantages. Chiefly, ning on a Windows system. What’s in a Name? you do not need an expensive Windows The history of Wine goes back to the To run Windows programs on Ubuntu, license. Programs will run almost as fast year 1993. At the time, Sun developed a Wine uses a fairly complex trick: It sits as on the Redmond operating system, small tool to run Windows applications between the Windows application and and windows behave as if they belong on its own Solaris operating system, Ubuntu like a simultaneous interpreter. to a native Ubuntu program. without the need for a Windows license If the Windows application says: “Draw An interpreter can only be as good as or other interaction. This software in- a button,” Wine passes this command its knowledge of the two languages, and spired Bob Amstadt and Eric Youngdale directly to Ubuntu. In contrast to Virtual- therein lies the problem: Because Micro- 30 ISSUE 01 UBUNTU USER Wine KNoW-HoW program fared in tests per- formed by Wine users. The Platinum rating is only awarded if a program runs without errors and without any impairment to func- tionality on Wine. A cou- ple of older CorelDRAW versions have made Gold status; the current X4 ver- sion refuses to cooperate entirely (Garbage). Adobe Photoshop CS2 will run more or less as the makers intended, whereas the cur- rent CS3 version has reached only Bronze status. Things are even worse in the case of Adobe Illustra- tor. As a rule of thumb, the older a program is, the bet- ter your chances are of get- ting it to work. Figure 1: The Wine database lists numerous applications that run on Wine – for example, the CorelDRAW A Wrench in the graphics package. Works Clicking on a program ver- soft refused to release details of its oper- cannot revitalize hardware with Win- sion tells you exactly what the trouble is. ating system until just recently, Wine de- dows-only driver support. A new window appears with details of velopers were forced to adopt a trial and what does and doesn’t perform as ex- error approach. Such a method involves Preparation pected. In addition, user reports at the time-consuming, painstaking work, and Before you fire up your package manager bottom and tips for talking the program considering the multiple-gigabyte operat- and launch into the Wine install, you into cooperating can be very useful. The ing system monster they were facing, it might want to take a look at the appli- steps this requires, some of which are was very much a labor of Sisyphus. On cation database on the Wine homepage very complex, are something you should top of this, some software manufacturers [1]. This database summarizes the level not attempt unless you are an experi- use some pretty nasty programming of support for various Windows tricks, and if you want to talk these ap- programs: whether or not they run plications into running on Ubuntu, Wine on Wine and, if so, how well be- needs to know these tricks. Unfortu- haved they are. To access the data- nately, most software vendors keep this base, go to the Wine homepage kind of information safely under lock and, from among the tabs at the and key. top, click AppDB. In the AppDB Despite years of work, then, Wine is area on the left, select Browse still officially under development, and Apps, go through the drop-down most of the work taking place now is list labeled Category until you find going into the fields of multimedia, the category and application you video, and 3D graphics. This said, Wine are interested in, and click on does support DirectX 8 and 9 quite well Update filter. CorelDRAW and by now. The developers started work on Photoshop are hidden below Mul- the tenth incarnation of this critical timedia | Graphics | Graphics Edit- graphics interface for games last year. ing, for example. Alternatively, An additional limitation is that Wine can use the search function to find only handle very simple 32-bit Windows your application in the database. applications, although improved support If you decide to investigate for 64-bit software is being worked on CorelDRAW, you are taken to the even now. page shown in Figure 1, where Wine has another disadvantage: It can you will find ratings for different Figure 2: This window shows you the current Wine only handle Windows applications; it versions that tell you how well the settings. UBUNTU USER ISSUE 01 31 KNoW-HoW Wine Figure 3: Start the Windows application installation file using Wine. Figure 5: Installing WinRAR with Wine. enced Ubuntu user. In some cases, pro- Launch System | Administration | Synap- The Wine Configuration tool will then grams refuse to work because Internet tic Package Manager, enter your pass- go on to create a hidden .wine directory Explorer is missing; for example, Lex- word in the resulting dialog, then type below your home directory. The soft- ware accounting software relies on Inter- wine in the search box and click Search. ware uses this directory to store the net Explorer for some operations. In the list of results, mark the wine entry basic configuration, which you can see If your application is still listed as bro- for installation. Synaptic will present a in Figure 2. Right now, do not modify ken in the database, you should check list of additionally required changes. anything here, but click Cancel to close the test date (in Test Results). If the test Now confirm these with Mark and start the tool. was a while back, you might want to ex- the installation by clicking Apply. periment yourself. Wine continues to Installing a Windows mature, and it is conceivable that your Preparations Program application has been taken care of. Wine integrates with the desktop start To take Wine for a test run, download Once you have established that your menu. To launch Wine, click on Applica- the WinRAR packer [2], then open the Windows application is likely to run on tions | Wine | Configure Wine. file manager. Next, locate the file and Wine, you need an installation disc for the Windows application. Although Wine is free of charge, you need a valid license for the Windows application. Installation Wine is included with Ubuntu and you can retrieve it from a repository. First, Figure 4: Choose "Open With" and select "Wine Windows Program Loader" for Win- dows applications. Figure 6: The Windows application WinRAR running on the Ubuntu desktop. 32 ISSUE 01 UBUNTU USER Wine KNoW-HoW start the installer by double-clicking on it. Alternatively, choose Open with "Wine Windows Program Loader" from the context menu, which opens after a right-click on any file (Figure 3). In WinRAR’s case, the self-extracting file wrar380.exe automatically executes the installer. In other cases, you might need to look for the installer for the Win- dows application in an archive file: It will typically be setup.exe, or autorun. exe. If Wine does not launch automatically Figure 8: Wine has a graceful approach to uninstalling Windows programs. after double-clicking on the installer, you should choose Open with Other Applica- entries as a con venient method for around: Each drive letter maps to an tion... (Figure 3), then choose Wine launching the Windows program. Ubuntu directory. Although a Windows Windows Program Loader in the window program running on Wine thinks it is shown in Figure 4. Now you just need to Tell Me Your Name storing data on drive C:, it is writing to a click Open. By default, Wine stores Windows pro- subdirectory called .wine/drive_c below Wine takes over in the background grams that think they are installing on the home directory. The Wine control and launches the Windows program. drive C: in a hidden subdirectory below center shows which letter maps to which Just follow the normal steps to install your home directory. To display the hid- directory. First choose Applications | the program. Although I talk about Win- den files, select View | Show Hidden Files Wine | Configure Wine or type winecfg dows drive letters in the next section, for in the Nautilus file browser, then change in a quick launcher (Alt+F2). Then visit now, confirm the default installation di- directory to .wine in your home direc- the Drives tab (Figure 7). The list at the rectory suggested by the application tory. One level below is a drive_c subdi- top shows you which drive letter maps (Figure 5). If any installer asks you to re- rectory and below this, Program Files to which Ubuntu directory.