DDG Tech Notes

I use WINE on an almost daily basis to run Windows binaries right in my Linux environment.  It is a requirement of my job, and virtual machines such as VMWare (or here), VirtualBox, etc.  just seemed like overkill.

However, I was recently surprised to discover that many people are not familiar with WINE, what it does, or how easy it can be to make it do it.  That, coupled with the recent post-beta, stable release of WINE itself, pushed me to help get the word out.

So, let’s start with a couple of questions:

What is WINE?

The answer from the WINE website is:

Wine is an Open Source implementation of the Windows API on top of X, OpenGL, and Unix.

Think of Wine as a compatibility layer for running Windows programs. Wine does not require Microsoft Windows, as it is a completely free alternative implementation of the Windows API consisting of 100% non-Microsoft code, however Wine can optionally use native Windows DLLs if they are available.

OK - so what does that mean?  It means that for a good number of Windows applications, you can simply get the EXE file (or COM, or accompanying DLLs) on your Linux-based computer and run them right in Linux.  That’s right - no rebooting your dual-boot system, no starting a virtual machine - just run it and have it integrated into your Linux/Ubuntu desktop environment.  Slick…

Why is it called WINE?

WINE is a recursive acronym for Wine Is Not an Emulator. It refers specifically to the fact that WINE is not intended to emulate a machine running a full install of Windows.  Instead, it is a rewrite of the native Windows API in an open-source format, without reliance on Windows native (and proprietary) code.  The whole idea is that Windows (like most operating systems) relies on calls to an underlying library of system calls.  If you know the system calls and what they are expected to do, you can easily (well, not so easily in practice) create libraries for any operating system or platform by simply accepting the same inputs (function parameters) and performing the appropriate operations to produce the expected output.

Enough with the techno-mumbo-jumbo.  What do I need to do to run a Windows application on my Ubuntu box?

Well, the answer is, that depends.  Ubuntu has long had packaged support for WINE (search for it in Synaptic) but as of this writing, it had not yet picked up version 1.0 (I’ve got 0.9.59 visible in my standard hardy repo currently). However, the fine folks at WINEHq have provided packages that are easily used, all you need to do it point your sources there.

Again, more technical mumbo-jumbo.  Can’t you just tell me how to get it installed?

Why yes I can.  The first step is to update where your system looks for packages.  First, you’ll need to open up a terminal window and make your system “trust” the location the packages come from.  This is done with the command:

wget -q http://wine.budgetdedicated.com/apt/387EE263.gpg -O- | sudo apt-key add -

You’ll be prompted for a password - that’ll be your password.

Next, you need to update your list of valid sources to use the repository of packages at WINE.  There are two ways to do this.

The first way is to (again, in a terminal window) add the following line to the file /etc/apt/sources.list:

sudo wget http://wine.budgetdedicated.com/apt/sources.list.d/hardy.list -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/winehq.list

And then run the command:

sudo apt-get update

Or, if you are not a fan of editing on the command line, open up Synaptic Package Manager by clicking on System –> Administration –> Synaptic Package Manager.  Once that opens, click on Settings –> Repositories.  This will open up a second window.  In that window, select the ‘Third-party Software‘ tab, and click on the ‘Add‘ button.  In the dialog box that comes up, for APT line, enter:

deb http://wine.budgetdedicated.com/apt hardy main

You’ll be prompted to refresh after you start closing down the windows.  Do so.

At this point, you can simply install the WINE package from Synaptic (or sudo apt-get install wine).

Great - now what?

If the above was successful, you should now see a menu item called ‘Wine’ under your ‘Applications’ menu.  This is where you will see your ‘Windows’ application show up after being installed.  You’ll also get “Open With Wine Windows Program Loader” on the right-click menu for files that the Desktop determines to be Windows executables.

For most of the Windows programs you want to run, it’ll simply be a matter of downloading the Windows installer for the application, and double-clicking on the executable file.

A word of Warning

If you are accustomed to running some sort of virtual machine that is running Windows on your Ubuntu computer, you’ll find this to be a little different.  Files written by programs run with WINE will just exists in your home directory - not some “virtual” disk file as in most virtual machine software.  You’ll also get a much tighter integration to your Ubuntu desktop environment that may throw you off at first, but will be a breath of fresh air once you get used to it.

Where can I find more info?

First off, the Main Wine web site.  I’d also like to thank Tom Wickline for pointing out http://www.wine-reviews.net/, another great place for all things WINEy.

Cheers, and may all of this WINE’ing end your whining about not being able to run what you want, when and how you want!

This entry was posted on Saturday, July 12th, 2008 at 1:21 am and is filed under Debian/{*}Ubuntu Diversions.... You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.