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CrossOver Plugin 1.0 Demo Version
jwnewman writes "CodeWeavers has released the Demo version of CrossOver plugin." I bought the regular version when it first came out, just to try it out. It's pretty impressive - I've only had some problems with it under Konqueror, but that's had more to do with my plugin setup. The demo version is a full version, but with nags in it. It's well worth checking out.
I've been waiting for this for a long time. Anyone know if all popluar quicktime plugins etc work?
Personally, i feel programs like these are great. However, having to pay for them takes the purpose out of any free operating system. I'd just assume use windows for those programs, rather then pay a company to allow me to use those programs on a different operating system. Although, i understand why these programs have to be paid for. With the current American Economy, noone will develop anything without a monetary incentive. I just hope somewhere there is someone with extra time who will design a program such as this out of the goodness of his/her heart!
AJ
-------
artlu.net
And it's probably violating half a million things....that's for tommorow's story though!
I guess that with the Episode II trailer the traffic on their website is at an all-time high.
Not A First Post!
For some reason, it bugs me that I have to pay money to use free (beer) plugins on a free (beer&speech) OS. Nice that they have a demo, though. I'll give it a shot; maybe it is worth the price.
Maybe they should have some 'home' (non-business) site license for about $25 ;-)
Looking for any old 8-bit Heathkit/Zenith software/hardware - http://heathkit.garlanger.com
My question is whether others out there think this is a good software model? Personally I think it is. They have identified a genuine lack of service which they provide. They provide this service by building on open source technology, namely wine, and then provide a closed for profit products on top of this technology. The revenue generated by these products allow for greater development in the underlying tech (again namely wine) while still providing the desired service, the Windows plugin support.
Aside from the "well these plugins are free on windows, we shouldn't have to pay for a product that lets us use them in Linux" comments. Do people have anything else they'd like to say about the CrossOver plugins or their business model?
Quicktime takes over my .png files, and netscape can handle that quite well. For quicktime movies it's quite impressive though. Just need mediaplayer support and then I'm all set :)
So basically, this will be like Winzip: everyone uses it, nobody pays for it. I wonder how long until the crack comes out...
main(c,r){for(r=32;r;) printf(++c>31?c=!r--,"\n":c<r?" ":~c&r?" `":" #");}
When I read the headline, I thought it said "cross-over beaver".
I guesss you could use a little wine to loosen it up.
When VPNs are outlawed, only outlaws have VPNs.
The links for HTTP and FTP download don't work for me but I found the directory anyway Clem.
I purchased Crossover several weeks ago and have been completely satisfied. Quicktime works great. Being able to watch the Fellowship of the Ring trailer on Linux is great! Shockwave works well for many sites. (In particular, Shockwave plugins for stuff like 3D has problems.) Codeweaver's tech support mailing list is great, the developers reply quickly and are very helpful.
While I would prefer that Crossover be free software, at least Codeweavers is contributing most of their improvements back to the main Wine project. Pretty much only the Crossover plugin itself is proprietary software. Buying Crossover is a great way to support the development of Wine and get Quicktime support on Linux right now.
I think the crossover plugin is a great idea, but I'm not sure how many people will go for the idea of paying to use plugins on linux that would be free to use under windows (AFAIK, those plugins are all free downloads for win). Kind of an odd turn, using the free Win version instead of paying for the Linux version...
do not read this line twice.
Note that the movie from the quicktime standalone screenshot on their site is CmdrTaco's "Hamster Havoc".
I cannot imagine a better day to release this than today.
Capitalize on all the frustrated geeks and their inability to find a non-Linux box to view the teaser.
Lemonade always sells better when it's hot outside.
I purchased Crossover when it was released. There were a few initial setup problems but their support is very good. I checked their archives and found an answer to my problem (pugger.so was conflicting with the QuickTime plugin in Netscape). Though I didn't report any problems I received emails from their support staff just to make sure everything was fine.
Performance is, for the most part, indistinguishable from a native Windows version on my 900MhZ Athlon. I understand that there is some initial delay the first time the plugin is started on slower machines. It's been fine for me though.
Netscape *seems* to be a touch more unstable with the plugin installed. There are occasional long delays but I have not confirmed that this is not just some DNS timeout or other Netscape instability (I'm running 4.78... I have not tried installing on 6.1).
"But even better, you can open this type of attachements directly from any mail client."
I am guessing it is only a matter of time before someone writes code that will wreak havoc on the linux community.
You never know when you have to go.
I generally don't buy software without having tested it out yet, and just playing with this software for ten minutes is more than enough time to justify the twenty bucks for the thing.
First time I've been truly impressed with some piece of software for Linux in the past nine months or so, and this is to the point where twenty bucks for the full version seems like it's UNDER priced.
Download the installer, run it, press a few buttons inside the config gui, and suddenly you can watch all the movies on quicktime.com.. with no stuttering or slowness.
Damn fine piece of work guys.
Unfortunately, I accidentally downloaded the CrossingOver plugin by mistake, and now all the Web pages I view ask me a lot of vague questions about dead relatives.
The three posters above me have completely missed shanek's point, namely that these plugins are available for free on Windows and Mac. He's simply saying that it's too bad that we don't have the same free (beer) access to these plugins that Windows and Mac users have.
:)
While it's true that he's getting his OS for free, what about those who buy Red Hat or Mandrake or whatever? Why should they have to pay for something that Windows and Mac users get free? That's his question really.
I intend to try it, and I'll pay for it myself if it works, though. I use Debian and therefore never have to pay for my OS.
I must be missing something, so flame away, thou trolling moderators, but where the hell is the full download at? Codeweavers seems to have a nice product if it works, but every download page links right back on top of itself, which is just about as annoying as trying to untangle scotch tape.
"See, we plan ahead! That way, we never have to do anything now."
You win, I'm turning communist. I guess I really had no choice. :(
Wow, I'm impressed, it actually works quite well. They got my $19.95.
One for every window you have open too.
Friendly reminder screens as they are called couldn't be further from the truth.
The quicktime pluggin seems to be working fairly well.
It's not really usable unless u buy it i guess.
Not too bad if you're using the player and not the plugin, since you can move the screen away from the nagboxes and still view it.
Liberty.
If I were you I'd move those bastards trailers out of the way at night when they've passed out or during the day when they're hanging out at the local mall.
I'd steal their Macaroni and Cheese, too.
If it counts, i'm another happy user of the CrossOver Plugin. What got me to jump on board and fork over cash for the 1.0 release? Easy. truth in advertising.
They made a point of telling the truth about their product and are making all due effort to support and enhance it. Great company who are doing a needed service for the Community. Not only that, they are a major supporter of the wine project. Got a few bucks? They deserve our support.
As for me, the software has been absolutely flawless. I did have some issues on a Mandrake box but it ended up being Crossover was fighing a battle with Plugger. One minor plugin deletion / restart later it installed like a dream.
Support the community! They deserve it!
On the other hand I'm sick of ugly, low quality plastic/cheap metal cases. CoolerMaster cases are... well, cool.
Quicktime in Linux?! Is this legal? Has Apple sanctioned this? What about the people who own the rights to codecs, such as the Sorenson codec. It seems like something would have to be reverse engineered...
Not to be nationalistic here (hey, I'm not even American), but it would be a mistake to disparagingly pin this on the "American Economy", since USA consititutes less than 10% of the world population, and (I'd venture to guess) a minority of the world's open source development population. If it we're just Americans who will not "develop anything without a monetary incentive", that would still leave the wide majority of the population searching for an excuse.
Better to chalk it up to human nature instead of the "American Economy".
Slashdot is entertaining like pro wrestling is entertaining
If only these would have been released under some opensource license. These plugins could have been implemented in the next version of SuSE/Redhat/Debian/name your dist. and would have really bridged a gap for getting windows users comfortable with using linux on the desktop.
Oh well, it's still cool news.
The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. - Benjamin Franklin
...it works really well considering the layers it has to pass through.
Yeah, it's a little slow but it's worth it to be able to watch Quicktime movies on my Linux Box. My friend and I both bought a copy because it isn't re-distributable but he sees potential for using it for other plug-in installations so it may be more useful than first thought.
If you've got the $20 to spare then grab it. It probably won't be the worst $20 spent in your life even if you don't use it much.
Useless opinions, worthless observations, and more!
Use wget to grab the .asf file, then use mplayer (which uses windows .dlls for codecs) to play ythe file. Works for me.
A sentence you'll never see on an Internet discussion board: "You know what? You're right."
Save for debian, there's nothing that prevents SuSE/RedHat/Mandrake/etc. from bundling this with their "Official" distributions. I'm betting the guys over at Codeweaver would negotiate some kind of bundling price.
Doug Alcorn
Otherwise, I'd say until Linux is there (and I hate to say it, but it's not, yet) than either dual boot, or think about another machine for your "day to day" stuff, and other for whatever reason...
I've always said, use the best tool to get the job done. If you're compromising here or there, than you're not really doing that.
This sounds like a great product. I don't understand the people here who disparage it because you have to pay for it - there is nothing that says you can't run payware alongside (or on top of, as the case may be) open source and *gasp* GPL'd software. Don't come down on it because it isn't "free" or Free.
Personally, I don't have a real need for this product, so I won't be buying it - I really don't ever see many QT trailers or whatnot to justify it, and all the Shockwave stuff can go out the window as well - give me quality content and information, I say.
I would much rather see the development of an open source video codec on par with Sorensen, and have it become well developed and widely used, but I tend to doubt such will happen, as so much of the tech involved in such an endevor is locked up in patents.
My main concern about such software (like this plugin) is that related to security - whether any exploits could be run against it to gain root access, or something. I tend to doubt this, and if you are running as a user, and you have a good firewall you should be mostly protected - but it is something I always have in the back of my mind...
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
etc. etc. etc.
Happy? I am. Just bought my copy. I feel good now.
Now even the slashgeeks will be moving from
universally readable web pages to proprietary formats.
I'll bet a lot of Sun employees will be surreptiously buying it so they can effectively communicate with the outside (MSFT) world...
How is this post "Redundant"? He was merely adding to shanek's thread about the logic of paying for plugins that are free! No one else had made the same comment, so how is it Redundant?
Must be Free Moderator Crack Day......
An actual installer! It understands the differences in Distros and even puts links/launchers/icons into the menu systems of BOTH KDE and Gnome! Wholy cow!
This is something that developers have needed to do forever. Forget the RPM vs DEB vs Tarball wars and make it easy for the user dammit!
We all gripe about Micro$oft developing software that is just bloated eye candy with crappy (or no) guts. IMHO Linux developers have been too busy neating up the guts to notice that no one uses their program beacuse it takes two friggin days to satisfy all of the needed dependancies just to compile and then annother two to figure out where the damn thing's files should reside.
Oh ya, after the install the product actually works as advertised too.
These guys get my $20!!! Kudos Codeweavers!
"Smile, listen, agree, and then do whatever the fuck you wanted to do anyway." ~Robert Downey Jr.
wget http://movie.url/movie.mov -O movie.mov && wine C:\whatever\quicktime.exe
Of course I'm sure some Dennis Ritchie wannabe is gonna reply to this and tell me how to do it with piping (you know you want to).
Would that be referring to the time that he forgot to use duct tape?
I suspect Apple can get a high quality, Linux native port of Quicktime done relatively quickly and inexpensively. However, what value does it have for Apple? Will it increase sales of other Apple software? Not likely. Will they sell alot of copies of the Pro version for Linux? Not likely. Will the port strategically help Apple in any real way? Nope. In Apple's mind, Quicktime for Linux has no value, so investing any time or effort into it is a bad idea.
Quicktime on Windows is a different story. It probably doesn't make Apple much money. I wouldn't be surprised if it cost more to develop than they make in Quicktime Pro sales. However, if Quicktime stopped being supported on Windows the world would move to another format (probably Windows Media) practically instantly. The market share of Windows is too important to miss. Apple needs Quicktime on Windows as part of their holding action. Linux doesn't have that leverage, so we're going to remain second class citizens for some time.
Installed flawlessly, nice configurator, it looks nice and best of all IT WORKS. I was skeptical at first but then I got to see the Star Wars trailer. I'm going to shell out the $20 for it. Try it out you might be as surprised as I was.
On a side note they don't disable the demo after 30 days. It looks like its more of an on your honor system. But it does put little messages to buy the software at the beginning of the movies. (At least in quicktime).
Again though, this looks like it was well worth it and the $20 goes to Wine.
The Anti-Blog
On balance, I'd say: don't use it unless you really have a very compelling need. View MS Office documents in StarOffice or AbiWord and submit bug reports for any problems you find; that's how those programs get better. As for Quicktime, complain to the web site using it and ask them to use an open format instead (in fact, do that whether or not you actually have a Quicktime viewer).
List of Fixes in 1.0.1
I just tried it out under RedHat 7.2. When I tried Quicktime it had no problem playing movies, but there is no sound. I tried using the powerpoint viewer on a presentation of mine, and all the fonts were messed up.
So it still has a few rough edges. If it worked flawlessly, they would get my money right away...
Cool, now I have something to play movs :) So now I can play mpg/avi/asf/wmv with PyhtonTheater, DVD with Ogle (more likely my PS2), realmedia with the realone preview release (XVideo support :). What this plugin lacks that all my other players has is XVideo support... Of course it is undertsandable, but I won't be kicking my movs into fullscreen any time soon..
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
They have an interesting coming soon product. I'm referring to the second item, basically a simple client workstation built just to run Windows apps, but without purchasing Windows. I don't think this'll take off for internet appliances (might as well make a special Linux distro for that with custom apps), but it may open some eyes to other possiblities. Maybe distros built specifically to replace MS licenses. Maybe transitional product lines for moving MS users to free-as-in-speech platforms. I think making that transitional product is a great idea, and of course charging for it is logical and potentially very profitable in the long run.
Having transitional products is the best way to show corporations how much money they can save from MS licenses, while getting them onto free software. This is very and sounds like a great business model (at least for this specific product).
Developers: We can use your help.
I installed the demo on my Linux box (Mandrake 7.2 using IceWM as my window manager). Crossover added itself to my IceWM menu file, except instead of simply *adding* itself to my menu file, it copied the default menu file *over* my menu file and then added itself to *that*. Basically, all of my custom changes to the default menu file were lost when I installed Crossover.
Aside from that, it works great (although Apple seems to have found a way to make the Quicktime 5 plugin never cache a downloaded movie on your local machine, which is annoying as fuck -- I want to view it whenever I want, without having to re-download it every time. Can you say "waste of bandwidth"?). I don't know if I'd use the Crossover plugin enough to justify paying for it, but we'll see.
"Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
Maybe a little off-topic, but when is Codeweavers going to release another preview version on Wine 1.0? Their "preview versions" work better than the snapshots at the Wine page.
inquiring minds want to know.
I got news for you: lack of Quicktime is very nearly last on the list of reasons why Windows users aren't switching to a Linux desktop.
That a lot of Linux people think it's near the top is, ironically, one of the things that is holding it back.
Here's some more news: no one will abandon Windows for Linux because of any Windows features Linux mimics, emulates or fudges. No matter how well Linux imitates it, Windows always does a better job of being Windows. Windows features on Linux are one of the few desparate strategies that might keep Linux from fading into useful BSD-like obscurity.
Edith Keeler Must Die
Install was mostly painless, but I did have to poke around a bit and 'activate' a couple of the plugins. Joe Average User might have some problems, but we're definitely getting closer.
Those "friendly reminders" are anything but. Damned annoying, IMO. Also, my fonts in Flash animations looked suspiciously like the default font in Netscape (I use Moz0.9.5) after I installed it. I uninstalled it after a few short minutes, mostly because of the annoying reminders, and the Flash fonts reverted back to their previous appearance.
While I do appreciate the usefulness of this product, Flash and Real already work for me, and that added to the annoying font issue make it not worth my $19.95 yet.
YMMV...........
Isn't there a native shockwave plugin for linux?
Way too much nag screen, if problems with plugins installation, you can't remove them, or reinstall the plugin. I just want to uninstall the whole thing, it's not working, doesn't find components...
Quicktime is nice and all but I'm surprised no one has asked if they have plans for WMP. I encounter 12x as many .wmv files in my daily surfings as I do .mov or quicktime movies.
Give me an operating WMP plugin and I'll pay you double what you're asking for this quicktime plugin.
unfortunately, skipstone breaks with quicktime installed...
even though mozilla works fine.
You see, without that little doohicky, the universe stops.
http://propheteer.org
One problem with porting QuickTime to Linux is that QuickTime needs a complete Window manager API because it has its own internal API for managing windows, menus, dialogs, etc. These routines call through to the underlying API which must have a large common subset of functionality to support the x-platform nature of QuickTime. So while QuickTime for KDE or QuickTime for Gnome are reasonable concepts, QuickTime for Linux is not. Of course, there is already QuickTime for Java which uses the Java API and runs on Linux.
The other thing is that Apple needs to do a LOT of work to bring the Cocoa API up to rough parity with the Windows, Java and Carbon versions. They won't make any commitments as to when, if ever, that work will be underway. If they took on Linux before Cocoa their developers would go postal.
Of course, having the default being disabled is rather questionable...
I bought it the day it came out, and don't have any problem with the idea. I do notice a certain sluggish instability using it which...reminds me of windows! I got 2 more windows plugins working with it, however, DANGER!, twice now the shockwave plugin has locked up the kernel process table! Hard to believe but quite obvious when it happened. The kernel crashed soon after. I wrote support but go no help. Guess I'll try the update.
tcboo
this is the only time anyone will ever hear me say this, but this is a good thing for distros to take care of for their users. i mean this is actually something to advertise, i mean really how can you really listen to a linux distro advertising about software you can download for free? anyway if distrobutions bought licenses in bulk and put a license in with a box distro, then you have the licensed software, and the linux company is supported by charging some overhead, because through buying in bulk, the price should drop. daniel all unix baby! but sadly not an advocate of linux for the common man. =-(
Is anyone able to stream videos in Netscape Communicator v4.78? about:plugins show MOV and QT is off. I checked my settings and they are checked. How about you guys?
Thank you in advance.
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
Is it really fair to say that they are profiting from free software? Their plugin exists because people want to be able to run proprietary software in the form of web browser plugins. People wouldn't buy the CrossOver plugin if all Windows based plugins were free software - in that case, people could just download the source for the Windows plugins and compile them for themselves.
I think it is more fair to say that they are making their profit from the proprietary Windows based plugins that their software is able to run. Eventhough these plugins are free (as in beer).
Does it have an uninstaller too?
It's cool, I only have one question:
:P
WHAT THE HELL IS QUICKTIME?
Maybe a bad thing about the opensource movement is that someone will say "it's already done" and not even try to put together a really free solution.
It has already been demonstrated that you could run plugins with wine, what Codeweaver did was adding a good installer. A distribuition could take that to another level by adding antialiased fonts and pointing the user to Microsofts free True Type Fonts within the installer.
sooner or later someone on the konqueror team (or some random someone somewhere, probably coding it right now) will release a free equivalent of this program, i really think...
To all the people griping that CodeWeavers is charging for the plugin, got news for you baby, there ain't no such thing as a free lunch. Perhaps, if CrossOver were a plugin hacked together by a bunch of guys with high paying jobs and a lot of spare time on their hands, it would be free. It wasn't. It was put together by a group of people for whom this is their job. They only get a paycheck if they turn out a product that the Linux community finds worthwhile to support. They need the paychecks to continue churning out nifty little gidgets like this, so they ask that if you like it, buy it. Not unreasonable. The advantage being, if you do support this company, perhaps someday they'll be financially secure enough to start releasing free plugins.
What amuses me is that the people whining that a $20 piece of software should be free are the people who pay $300 for a video card. Same principle applies - someone had to take the time to build it.
To the rest of you who are using it and liking it, thanks. Those of us who are stuck using Windows at work due to computer illiterate upper management are glad to have people supporting a company that's making a product enabling the arguement for a MicroSuck free environment. "We can't change from Windows because otherwise we wouldn't be able to open apps that other developers send us." - BAH!