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Playing Nice: Reviews of CrossOver Office, WineX 4
JimLynch writes "One of the more common questions experienced Linux users get asked by those considering migrating from Windows to Linux is, "Will my Windows applications run under Linux?" Thanks to the folks at CodeWeavers, the answer to that is yes--for some applications, anyway." And Dan Dole writes "Linuxlookup.com staff member Rich reviews Cedega (WineX 4.0), give it a 20/20 score & Editors Choice Award.
"The release of Transgaming's newest version of WineX, renamed Cedega, was met with considerable enthusiasm and interest in the Linux community last week. So much so that their server was inaccessible the day of release. Cedega is claimed to be much improved, offering the ability to play recent games released for Windows "seamlessly and transparently" under Linux. They provided me with a copy, and I was curious to see if it lived up to the hype.""
... and now cedega. Gotta say, it's pretty painless on gentoo.
/usr/portage/distfiles, ran the emerge, then done.
:D
Per the ebuild instructions, I registered w/ transgaming, ponied up my 20 bucks (or whatever), downloaded the file, copied it into
I was playing American McGee's Alice 20 minutes after starting my first "run a Windows(tm) game on linux" adventure. Even impressed the Mrs.
Cedega is claimed to be much improved, offering the ability to play recent games released for Windows "seamlessly and transparently" under Linux.
So they crash most of the time?
"I think everyone is an agnostic but just doesn't know" - Frazz
This isn't true, it's never been true, and it likely will never be true.
Of course, the best answer, I think, is "try it an see." Without source code to see how tightly integrated a program is with Win, it is very hard to tell. When you do the experiment, sometimes you get a pleasant surprise.
I recently finally migrated my main office workstation to Linux, and am dual booting since there are a few things I still need Winders for. One such, I thought, was a program called MoluCAD by New River Kinematics, a molecule drawing program that I really, really need.
The other day, I tried it with wine, and BOOM! It worked!! Yeah.
It's important, too, to document when a program does not work.
Computational Chemistry products and services.
How do we expect to be able to say YES to "Will my windows application work under linux" when we cant say 100% YES to "Will my windows application from 1995 work on windows XP?"
Im dreaming ofa big bndwdth, That can resist the
i have linux installed in my notebook. It is a rather old one, but still suitable for my needs.
I dont want to run win98 on it, much less pay $$$ for a windows xp upgrade.
All i need at work is a browser, ssh, sapgui and lotus notes.
I use wine daily at work to run lotus notes on it. it works flawlessly. actually, most of the time i forget that im "using" wine, as i have a icon shortcut that launches notes directly.
i dont know if wine will ever be "popular", but it is very useful for my needs, and i thank the developers for that
You're thinking logically. Some software developers throw in deliberate restrictions that have no logical grounds whatsoever.
Case in point: Thief: Deadly Shadows. Ion Storm says that you MUST run the game under an account that has full Administrative rights. There is no reason to require that a game run with Administrative rights, and no sane Windows user should be using an account with Administrative tasks for playing a game. The restriction is not a matter of the game needing Administrative access for anything. The game can function just fine under a Power Users account. However, the geniuses at Ion Storm decided that they wanted to lock players into this asinine restriction, so they programmed the game to self-destruct by deleting all of the files in its System directory (the game's System directory, not that of Windows) when a non-Admin tries to run it. There is a workaround -- give non-Admin users read-only access to the files (since the game's config and save data is stored elsewhere) -- but that is an example of a completely illogical and pointless restriction deliberately placed on software by a developer. Having the software discover that it's being run under Linux via Wine and self-destructing in much the same way is not a far stretch.
STOP MISUSING APOSTROPHES, YOU MORONS!!!
Star Trek: Armada, Star Wars: Force Commander, Star Wars: Rebellion. Games are also apps, and all three of these worked fine in 2k but will either crash or be unusable in XP. when my girlfriend upgraded to 2k, the print shop program that came with her printer wouldn't even install yet worked fine in 98.
I'd have better examples but I just have windows for games now, but its pretty well documented that Windows backwards compatibility isn't always so backwards compatible.
"I use a Mac because I'm just better than you are."
I purchased a license to Crossover Office several months ago. At first, I figured it'd run rather slow and wouldn't be good enough for production. I paid anyways just to try and support the programmers.
I installed Microsoft Office and Adobe Photoshop. Microsoft Office is practically transparent as to how fast it runs. It loads up very fast and runs very smooth. As far as Photoshop, it runs pretty good as well. There are little bugs with the different windows and the toolboxes, but it works. for the most part.
For production, I dont think Adobe Photoshop is ready yet (version 7 by the way). Office I think is more than ready. I also installed IE so I could preview websites I'm working on in IE natively without having to go to another windows computer. On top of that, I installed the Quicktime plugin and I watch trailers from Apple.com with no lag.
I give Crossover Office a 10/10. Well worth every penny I spent.
The greatest experience we can have is the mysterious.
- Albert Einstein
Because if you are, you're wrong. They aren't supporting the segment of the linux community that says "Ohh Noo Nothing but native linux apps for us, windows sux0rs and must burn in hell!" They're supporting the segment that says "Hey, I've used windows for a long time, and I like linux a lot, and I'd like to be able to play/run my windows stuff on my linux box. Can you help a guy out?"
There are plenty of developers in the world. These people are supporting that segment of the linux community that desires the ability to run windows applications on linux.
We can debate all we want about if this is a good strategy in the long term. But there's no doubt that these companies are strongly supporting (parts) of the linux community.
I have Cedega loaded and I've been off Windows totally since last November. This machine has never even had Window loaded on it. Since day one it's been Linux (Gentoo btw).
Cedega(Winex) runs everything I would normally play if this were an XP box. My wife still has her XP machine, and the games that I had, I played on that machine. So when I went 100% Linux, I thought I would have to give up my games as I'm not a fan of dual booting...or else just play them on her machine.
As it turns out, the games I play (Warcraft 3, Neverwinter Nights, Everquest, Counterstrike, UT2003/2004) all either have a native Linux client or work great under Cedega. And from what I can tell, it will work with World of Warcraft when it comes out...which is really the only game I'm looking forward to playing in the near future (ther than Call of Cthulhu).
So guess what folks, I Windows ain't needed at all on my computer. Not that I'm a MS hater or anything, just didn't feel like shelling out 100 bucks for the OS as I had to build this machine with little to no money.
This is just my experience, you're milage may vary...especially if you're looking to play a game that isn't supported. But the ones I play, play just the same as if on Windows, yet faster as I can switch to another desktop while playing EQ full screen to check on something quickly. I mean, it's INSTANT switching to another desktop. Playing EQ full screen on my Wife's XP machine you have to wait and wait and wait to get to the desktop, THEN the computer runs like molasses.
"Music is everybody's possession. It's only publishers who think that people own it." - John Lennon.