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Google Windows Apps Coming To Linux
skaet writes "DesktopLinux.com reports that Google is working together with CodeWeavers to bring their photo editing and sharing program Picasa, formerly only available on Windows, over to Linux. From the article: 'The program is now in a limited beta test. If this program is successful, other Google applications will be following it to the Linux desktop, sources say. The Linux Picasa implementation includes the full feature set of the Windows Picasa 2.x software. It is not, strictly speaking, a port of Picasa to Linux. Instead, Linux Picasa combines Windows Picasa code and Wine technology to run Windows Picasa on Linux. This, however, will be transparent to Linux users, when they download, install, and run the free program on their systems.'"
Google earth on linux please!
Google? Beta? Who'd have guessed?
I knew Wine started out as a tool to migrate source code bases from Windows to Linux, but this is the first time I've heard of it being used for that (as opposed to doing conversions at runtime).
Go Google! I can't wait to see how it pans out, and how other companies watch Google in this step.
I think Google by some magic will be able to make Linux for friendly to the desktop far more then all the money that IBM and SUN puts into it. Because it seems that Google may actually do something about it while the other guys just R & D it . The program looks like it may fill in an other knitch that the GIMP may not be able to handle easily. It seems to be a lighter photo editing tool.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Wine. So that means their still Windows applications then?
Using programs in wine is painful. It's definitely one of those areas where you only do it if you have to, not if you have a choice. Since Picasa is hardly the only such program available for Linux, why bother if it's only going to be half-assed? Who wants to manage a wine installation to run Picasa. Anyone? Do any of you really want this?
The solution to complaints that Google makes no effort to port their software to Linux isn't to get CodeWeavers to make it run when used with winelib. It's to port the software to Linux. Otherwise just tell Linux users to sod off, because that's basically what linking with wine is doing.
For those who remember Kylix, this sounds like an awful idea. Borland basically did the same thing with their Delphi IDE when they ported it to Linux, and it turned out very poorly.
It was slow, crash-prone, and just plain messy to install. While WINE has likely improved since then, I'm still not convinced that it is suitable for use in production applications.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
Does this mean every Beta-Tester gets like 5000 invites, and everyone they invite gets another 5000?
Btw, anyone want a GMail account?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
when google releases apps, i keep hearing "what? no linux?". You'd think this would shut them up abit, but i'll bet half the posts will be about no native/no source or no port to some obsecure distro.
Typically when one says their software support Linux, it means that their program can be compiled (or at least easily ported to) the major non-x86 platforms, including PPC and SPARC.
Wine, however, is only for x86-compatible systems. Will this software from Google only run on x86 Linux systems, and not on PPC Linux and SPARC Linux, amongst other Linux ports?
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
From the article:
The new program is reportedly re-tooled to work perfectly under CodeWeaver's CrossOver Office Wine emulation. This may mean that Linux Picasa is using the program's own native Windows DLLs (dynamic link libraries).
This gives me a very odd feeling.
While for one side this will be very good for Linux users as this technology may be used in the future, allowing a fast deployment and development of very good programs, will this also mark a real beginning for Linux closed-source programs and binary installations?
If I clone myself, can I call it a thread?
If a girl winks to us, can I call it a race condition?
But the problem with Wine is one of quality. That's not to suggest that the Wine team hasn't done a great job. They sure have, considering what they have to work with (the Win16 and Win32 APIs). But the past ports of software to Linux via Wine have been terrible. Kylix is one example, and the port of WordPerfect by Corel another. They were slow, buggy, and not very impressive.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
While interesting emulation never seems to be able to come close to the experience of a native application besides the problem of writing files to partitions and printing. Perhaps they (Codeweavers/Wine developers) should start a "code rewrite" service to help companies port their applications?
I only have IE running in emulation for some basic webdesign checking and it doesn't behave that well (missing functions, lock-ups). I tried running CAD software in emulation, but it just isn't it.
I've already got Picasa up and running on Wine, but I never use it because it references files on the c: drive (shudder) - will that be the case with this thing - or will there be proper paths?
Genesis 1:32 And God typed
I wonder if they will use winelib?
Seews like a neat way to do it, and it will look like any other native app.
I wonder if Google hasn't heard of the term "cross-platform" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-platform). I think Google should delve once into this "http://wyoguide.sf.net/papers/Cross-platform.html ".
See http://wyoguide.sf.net/papers/Cross-platform.html
Technically, when you're using Wine to run your own application which you can compile to the target architecture, there shouldn't be an issue apart from endianness fluff that might be exposed in the Windows API. Which is unlikely, given that Windows NT was available for Alpha, PowerPC, ...
It'll probably be like any application that comes with its own GUI, networking, etc, library.
Hopefully Google will make it transparent enough to only need a single shared Wine install between different Google applications, rather than, for example, statically compiling Wine into it!
Google Throws Linux Users a Bone
An old, marrowless, dried up, bone, with no meat on it, and, yet, there it is.
Basically they're making a Windows app run on Linux, using Wine. Why didn't we think of that?
Damnit, Jim, I'm an anarchist, not a F@#$!^& doctor!
Well, many of their other famous works were mainly done in JavaScript...
Given Google don't make any money from Picasa, the Linux client is a loss-leader. So, it makes sense to get the first Linux version in the easiest way possible. And that is Wine. That's what it was written for. In the free software world, there is always someone who will say "I want that for free!", and "Now that I have it for free, I want it better". If you do that in a restaurant, they'll sprinkle crumbled turd on your food. On the internet, all they can do is ignore you.
Check out the code contributions - there are lots of bugs found & fixed by the Google guys that are working on this. It's not like they are saying "Go run on wine, we don't care", it's "Go run on wine, and we've given you the most help we can".
A tool like Picasa, which was written from the ground up for Windows, is not a candidate for a "Linux Port". It would need a "Linux re-write". Maybe a future version could be built using tools to help with platform independance...but Google have much bigger things to worry about.
John
Does this mean that, at long last, we can play with Google Earth on linux?! Why that would make this day almost worth keeping around!
With the Intel fiasco unfolding for Apple it should be clear that the Mac hardware's days are numbered - unless you really believe the world is waiting around to throw money at an Intel exclusive x86 OEM...
Apple and Google should form some sort of strategic partnership where the OS X application APIs, ie. the current Cocoa/Carbon hybrid, is ported to both Linux and Windows. Along with a full set of development tools - Eclipse of course, not those piece of shits VS or Xcode - that provide one click fat binary generation for both Linux and Windows systems.
This current plan for Linux versions of Google's apps is a joke - and stands to most likely do more damage than good to their reputation in the Linux community.
Perhaps Google is quietly gaining experience with desktop Linux (Ubuntu) and WINE for a future assault on the Microsoft-dominated desktop. Microsoft will try very hard to switch people away from win32 apps and onto WinFX apps, where they have much tighter control (patents, DRM, etc.). Also, Microsoft knows that win32 will soon be 99%+ reverse engineered to run on Linux, so they have a huge interest in killing win32. Circa 1999 Intel wanted to kill x86 to increase profit margins and gain a tighter control of the market via IA-64 (Itanium), a highly IP-encumbered ISA. In the process, Intel left an x86-64 gap. If Microsoft leaves a win32 gap, like Intel did with x86-64, perhaps Google will fill that gap with Linux/win32, just as AMD filled Intel's gap with AMD64, leaving Intel scrambling and Itanium stagnating. I would guess that Microsoft will do better with WinFX than Intel is doing with Itanium, but how much better is the interesting question!
Oh look, a compnay starts doing well for itself and all of a sudden it is tarred with the same brush as other large corporations, bring them down, just be happy that at least it is a company with 'relatively' good products and business ethics, in case you haven't noticed, when you start a business like google, you have a tendancy to make money, this does not mean it is evil!
I'm just guessing but presumably they make money when you order prints from Picasa? e.g. Kodak pay them a referral fee?
I wonder why they just dont make a native port?
Anyone remember how transparent it was to run Corel's wine-remixed WordPerfect Office?
Wine has come a long way since then, so I suppose it could be translucent.
Eviscerati.Org: All Hail the Eviscerati
The Kylix IDE used winelibs but was not a win32 executable.
'Once scientists, even the dim-witted social scientists, get muzzled, the Western Civilization is finished.' - oldhack
"This, however, will be transparent to Linux users, when they download, install, and run the free program on their systems."
After becoming enlightened by RMS, I hesitate to call any binary only code "free". It is free
to install and become dependent on their binary code, but when they stop supporting it and it no longer works, it may create a lot of trouble for you. Perhaps it should be called "free" as in free nicotine or cocaine or heroin, or something more addictive than beer.
Let me get this straight. Because Google won't pay even more money to port their *free* application to your tiny minority-within-a-minority platform, their contribution is a turd and they deserve to be sworn at. Aren't Linux users nice people.
I gotta say nothing out there for linux even remotely compares to Picasa. I tried F-spot the other day and man is it still very alpha compared to Picasa. Digikam is the closest but if Picasa runs smoothly and keeps its online photo service access then I see it becoming very popular. It's just a pleasure to use and you can get very good results with little effort. I've been using it since before Google bought the previous owner out and it's worked out well for anyone I've showed it to.
People complaining should be happy that anyone at all these day is bothering with porting over desktop apps to linux.
If you wanna get rich, you know that payback is a bitch
Just a quick question though. I use Google Chat (Google Talk within the Gmail Ajax interface) at school without problem on Windows boxes (With Firefox). At home it does not work under Linux (with Firefox again). Has anyone else gotten it to work under linux? and would it be possible for my browser to spoof my operating system in order to let me use it under linux anyway? I am under the impression that Ajax is not in any way platform specific.
I may be wrong but you're downright ugly!
"It's a turd from the catbox."
Uh oh, I think google is in league with the felines. Do you suddenly find yourself more active and attracted to cat urine?
For all you bitching about it running wine, Mabie you should take a large windows based app and try and port it, Its more work than you think.
:-)
This could be a step in the right direction, If google are truly experimenting with linux, Mabie in future they will write their apps with portability in mind? Writing portabaly may be a pain in the arse, but less so than porting
If, by saying "doing well for itself", you mean, doing business with oppressive regimes, then I guess it's all just down to irrational fear of big companies. I think the comment that Google is making some very UN-egalitarian moves right now is very fair. If they want to battle with Microsoft they will probably have to be as aggressive and that doesn't necessarily bode well.
It is 2006 and win32 is 97% of the market for desktop apps like Picassa.
Have you ever USED Picasa? It's an APPLICATION (not a WEB application) that runs on your desktop and helps you organize and perform basic edits/adjustments to your images. It also has the added feature (after Google bought it a couple years ago) of allowing users to easily upload pictures to their blogspot or e-mail it through GMail (not sure about the GMail feature as I haven't tried the latest version, but I seem to remember hearing about this). It's got an awesome GUI, but other than that (and the Google specific tie-ins) it doesn't do much more than other photo organizing apps already available in Linux.
Still, this is a decent start. I'd be more excited about them porting the desktop search (as long as I can still disable the sharing of info. to Google).
Read my blog posts on usability.
Yeah, it already works in Wine, but it would be nice to be able to run it without that.
-- null
As far as the Windows platform goes, it doesn't run on 64 bit Windows or Windows 2000.
WIN2K can't be compatibility reasons -- maybe its release date of 01/00 instead of 10/01
You won't need Wine to run the newly-linuxized Picasa... they're basically recompiling it to a native app using the Wine libraries, that's all.
TFA is a bit light on details but it sounds to me like they are using Winelib to port to Linux, not simply providing an installer to run the Windows binaries under Wine.
This is a very significant difference because Winelib is not x86 specific (unlike Wine). This will be a native application capable of running anywhere Linux runs (or FreeBSD). They would only be using Winelib as an API wrapper so they don't have to rewrite every line of code.
I think they will even get Mac OS support, which might be important as I can't actually see many Linux fans liking the very frustrating interface Picasso provides.
Lemme get this straight. They get all this benefit of running linux on their servers and yet no one of their applications get fucking ported to linux. Then to shutup the OSS crowd, they want to give out a half assed solution ?
Do you really want the majority of Linux software to turn into what they have on Windows and Macs? The vast majority of software on those platforms is binary-only shareware. Everytime some pissant little programmer writes a program to do anything of consequence they slap on a registration requirement and it instantly costs $25-$50 for some stupid little utility. With Linux, on the other hand, the vast majority of software is not only completely free, it's open source! Unless we continue to support open source products and shun the closed proprietary binary-only shareware crap the Windows and Mac users are stuck with the Linux platform will lose one of its main rallying points.
Really. Can't Google port their code to something like wxWidgets? The API is similar to Windows but it works so much nicer. I love how it makes apps look and feel native on the running platform.
"It ain't a war against drugs.it's a war against personal freedom" --Bill Hicks
You've never purchased a product with the stamp "Made in China"? Why are you held in a different light than Google or any company that does business in China?
Picasa is closer to iPhoto than it is to Flickr. Uploading is not the half of it. The focus is on organizing and basic editing (adjusting levels, reducing redeye, etc.)
I would quite like to see the commercial Linux software market take off. There is a lot of good open source software and there are a lot of crappy utilities that cost money on Windows, but a lot of the commercial software is far better quality than any Free alternative (compare PS Elements 4 for ~$80 to the free alternatives, for example). I will gladly pay money for software if it saves me time and effort.
With all of this hype, will they actually make it open source, or a just a binary? I dislike not being able to compile the software that I use. Then again I am probabbly just finnicky
Why are they bothering? This is going to be greeted with all the enthusiasm of someone breaking wind in a swimming pool. It's great that Google have realized that it has people who want to use it's services that run linux but unless they are going to do the porting job properly I don't think they should do it at all.
Perhaps that's a little harsh but I don't want some clunky Windows app with a ton of Wine libs following it around cluttering up my system. Personally I find digiCam to be as good if not better than Picasa so I think I'll stick with that - certainly on Linux I feel that is the application they are competing against.
I used to have a better sig but it broke.
Don't get me wrong, Codeweavers are doing a great job with Office-type programs, but they're still far from perfrect in execution. If you've used Crossover for any length if time, you'd know that running most apps for more than a few minutes at a time requires multiple "Terminate Windows Applications" per day. And they probably will never run as well as they would natively precisely because of the necessity of windows libs.
Unlike what you seem to think, Picasa is not a photo editing tool.
Rather, it is some sort of photo organizer/viewer. It does have a few (very simple and easy to use) tools to enhance contrast/color etc., but it's purpose is nothing like Photoshop/Gimp/PaintShopPro/etc.
Sorry for not being more clear about what it really is. It's probably because I still wonder myself... Maybe someone who has actually found a use for it can be clearer.
It's great that google realizes that programs need to be ported to linux, however hopefully you don't need to use codeweavers software to use it. Or wine even, I don't want to have to install wine myself to use this, it would be nice if Google wrapped winelib in with Picassa. (which they most likely should).
Um I'm not sure what your problem is per say but using Firefox 1.5 google chat works perfectly without a single glitch in linux (ubuntu breezy and daper installations for both 32bit and amd64 setups).
I have *not* tried firefox 1.0.x and I'm hoping that may be your issue but yeah linux = zero problems at all with anything that google throws up.
From the article:
Wine is not, as has sometimes been said, a Windows emulator...
Next Paragraph:
The new program is reportedly re-tooled to work perfectly under CodeWeaver's CrossOver Office Wine emulation.
If I hadn't spent countless hours trying to get ANYTHING useful running in Wine, I might be confused.
Given Google don't make any money from Picasa, the Linux client is a loss-leader
They don't make money for sure but they get exposure. People will recognize the brand "Google", use their search engines more, click on adds supplied by Google and $PROFIT$! My mother, a total computer illiterate, uses Google above anything else. For her Google is the internet. And IMO that is what google is doing by giving away free software. It's a PR move, pure and simple, to promote the brand, Google.
Companies don't give out free software out of the goodness of their hearts. They do it because they have a plan behind it. This plan usually involves green pieces of paper with dead presidents on them.
Honestly, if Google was truely serious about creating a Linux based GOOS then why do a half assed "port" of picasa using Wine. Wine has always resulted in half assed implementations of Windows software, often lacking real performance and often many features disabled. I am surprise Google with all their newly minted billions would not just higher a bunch of Linux Developers and make a native Linux version of Picasa.
And don't fool yourselves, Wine IS an emulator. Anything that has to mediate between native software code and native OS/Hardware code is an emulator. It may not be a hardware emulator (i.e. not translating to machine code the software code wasn't written for), but it is a software emulator translating windows calls to Linux calls. And in any case, emulators are slow.
I haven't thought of anything clever to put here, but then again most of you haven't either.
Don't know if any of you /.'s see this Google mini.
So Here is the link.
http://services.google.com/mini_landing.html
I'm mostly a little disappointed that they didn't write their apps in a cross platform manner to start with. There really is no good reason for that, is there? Especially as they most certainly would know there would be a demand for it? It's one thing to have old legacy apps that would be hell to port, quite another to paint yourself into the corner with eyes wide open.
All in all, I like what they are doing, but I am a bit unhappy that Windows is treated so special.
Spine World
I will get really excited when they port Google Earth.
I LOVE GOOGLE EARTH!!!
Wha? what do you mean "only runs on intel processors"? You mean this is x86-binary only? Yeah that mindset served us really well in the past...
Maybe that's just me, but until they GPL their code this is a non-story. Wine getting more bugfixes on the other hand is good news. It's always nice to see an open source project progress - especially with help from commercial vendors.
Code is Speech. No to Censorship.
Y'know what? If you don't like shareware, don't use it. Use the free stuff. I like free stuff, you like free stuff, we ALL like free stuff. It's not like it's gonna dry up and blow away, and some competition from closed source apps would be good all around I think. If the free app can't hold up against some "stupid little utility", well then it probably wasn't that good to begin with, and the only reason it was being used was because it was free, and the only game in town. To me, the main rallying point of Linux is that it's not made by MS. I could care less if it was free or open source, really (if that's your thing, more power to ya, I just want my machine to do what I want it to in order to work or play). I've paid for many distros in the past, I forsee that continuing into the future, and I don't have a problem with that because I know the difference between free beer and free speech.
I, for one, would absolutely love to see apps such as AutoCAD and 3DS Max running native on Linux. Give me commercial apps. I'll buy 'em, as would many others. Sorry guys, it's not just a hobby OS anymore, nor is it just for servers. We want workstation apps, not just a word processor, spreadsheet and solitaire. Nor do I want windows app compatability. I want NATIVE apps. While I'm not thrilled about the winlib idea here, it is indeed a step forward.. as long as they keep going forward and the first chance they get to do a re-write (major version change maybe?) do it for full cross compatability. I can see using this to get started down the path of richousness, but not as an end goal. I do NOT want anything like the OS/2 win compatability to happen (which was, IMO the downfall of OS/2).
We have enough youth, how about a fountain of SMART?
You can simply install the 32-bit binaries that are available for your distribution though. I've successfully used this method to run Windows apps on a 64-bit FC3 install.
And anyways, Google didn't write Picasa, they bought it.
If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.
Well, in the case of Picasa, the reason is that they didn't actually write it at all. They bought it.
If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.
With Linux, on the other hand, the vast majority of software is not only completely free, it's open source!
I'm sure you realize this, but 99% of that free, open source software you love so much is not Linux-specific. In fact, it compiles and runs just fine on a Mac exactly like it does on any Unix or Unix-like platform. Mac users hardly feel "stuck" with anything, since they can choose to use native OS X software (which sometimes costs money) or any of the open source software which you mistakenly think of as "Linux software." Sounds like the best of both worlds to me.
It makes it difficult to work yourself into a froth of frustration, but the world isn't nearly as bipolar as you seem to believe it is. For open source to succeed it is not necessary for closed-source software to fail. Neither is the opposite true -- if open source software fails to increase in popularity it isn't necessarily the fault of the closed-source world.
Support open source all you want, but you'd be well-served by losing that ridiculous notion that "shunning closed, proprietary software" is doing anything at all to help open source software gain acceptance or improve.
Google will one day rule the world
Thake These facts bout google into account
Its soo nice to everything and everyone...
It works everywhere...
Its Free...
It offers soo many features...
Its a globaly know company...
Is it just me or does any think there has to be a MAJOR catch to all this?
From the referenced article:
Thoughtless comment. Why is this rated at 2??? Should be a -(insert numeric figure).
Why not write a /proper/ app that's crossplatform rather than the abortion this is going to be?
.. OSX (for christ's sake, keep with 10.3 as well, not everyone wants to 'upgrade' to tiger)
And if you're doing to do a *nix port, why not start with the largest *nix installed userbase out there
Make sure you're not connected to the https://mail.google.com/ version of gmail. You want to connect to http://mail.google.com/ You may need to clear your cache/cookies as well, but I didn't need to. I have connected to the SSL version of gmail for a long time and I thought the same as you. Then I read the googlem mail discussion list and they had a few posts about how google chat doesn't work under https mode.
Nice bunch of lies and FUD, pal.
Whenever I hear the word 'Innovation', I reach for my pistol.
Will this thing work even if one has LINUX installed but without WINE? Will the app install WINE (sorry but I didn't RTFA, yknow to fit in with this crowd) or at least enough of WINE to make it run?
If you live in a city, and stay in that city, it's a fancy map. No different than Google maps in that respect, or for that matter most printed or electronic maps. The satellite views can be cool, but in a city they're mostly a toy. You can sometimes get a clearer idea of the true layout of freeway exits and mass transit lines with it.
However, outside of population centres, it's simply amazing. Instant lat/lon co-ordinates to anywhere on Earth. Altitude readings (although these are only accurate to within 10-20% I've found, they're still damn useful). Measure, to the metre, ANYTHING. Doing this sort of work with regular maps is a pain, especially for those of us who aren't cartographers by trade.
In short, if you ever go back-country camping, do any hiking, or even just wander off the beaten path, Google Earth is one of the most useful applications ever written. I personally use it nearly every day, whether I'm mapping out a new area to wander around in, seeing where I've been (importing GPS data is awesome!), or just poking around trying to find some way up a stubborn uncharted mountain.
Last summer I used it to find a very remote, very beautiful, VERY hard to find campsite I had used back in the 90s. Since then friends and I had tried to find the site without success, on 4 separate occasions. One of those "you might stumble into it by chance" type places. With Google Earth, we found it in less than an hour of hiking.
Endless arguments over trivial contradictions in books written by ignorant savages to explain thunder in the dark.
Ok, I know they bought Picasa but why not the other way round? .NET app over to Windows? This would feel much more native on both platforms and should be much easier.
;-/
Why not found F-Spot and port a simple
Well, I might just be stupid, but Id prefer a free tool over a winelib binary any day.
Probably noone will care but me. again.
nice one. :) Still paranoid?
Seeing that wine 0.9.3 runs just fine on my AMD64 Gentoo (and yes, it's compiled in 64 bit mode) I'd say that either your distribution's package repository sucks or you haven't even tried installing wine.
If you'll excuse me, I have just noticed that the 0.9.5 ebuild is out. *goes off to emerge -uDavN world*
USE HOT GRITS WITH STATUE OF NATALIE PORTMAN (NAKED AND PETRIFIED)
Remember when Corel "ported" Wordperfect to Linux? They used wine and it was a miserable failure. However Corel's attempt failed where google might succeed as maybe google won't make the same mistakes.
Corel forked wine to add some custom features they needed that head wine didn't have (fonts and printing, for example). This fork proved their undoing. It was never synced back to the head branch and soon died, orphaning their version of wine. Further glibc advances broke wine with every release, effectively preventing corel's wine from running on anything newer than RH 7.
As long as google doesn't do the same thing, we'll probably be okay.
Instead of hoping and praying that Google will do what you want, why not look at NASA's World Wind and port it to Linux yourself? This is an Open Source world -- stop being so passive.
-russ
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
Because so much stuff on the market is made in China we get it shoved down our throats. Google had a choice. They failed to make the good choice and instead made an evil one. The Tiananmen Square massacre is well within living memory of most Chinese and continues to serve as a warning to this day. I don't see the difference between complying with China's government and dealing with, say, Hitler.
As to Picassa, they can keep it. Very annoying and rather slow. I'd much rather see FastStone's Image Viewer ported to *nix (even if it requires using Wine's libs) than Picasa.
I dream of a better world... one in which chickens can cross roads without their motives being questioned.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
LOKI did not use WINE to port the games.
They really ported the games to linux, meaning that the games were linux pure binary with no
"emulation" layer (even thought that WINE Is Not an Emulator).
They job were "simpler" because most of the time they had to translate
direct3D to openGL (if the game did not have an openGL driver),
DirectSound to OpenAudio (or something like that equivalent to openGL for
sound that they created) and the rest of DirectX to SDL.
Basically the game source became mostly thru cross-plataform as openGL, OpenAudio and SDL
can be run anywere.
Picasa2 already runs perfectly for me via Wine, I guess that's why they are using some Wine code in the port...
I could also say that Microsoft does not make any money with IE and that would be true in a shallow kind of way. The free stuff from large companies is not about making money directly. It's about the control that fosters their money making products and services. That's how Microsoft is doing it. Microsoft has control of the desktop and it is that control that enables them to make money with their software and services.
Don't kid yourself, Google has something to sell and that's ads. Google is becoming a very powerful marketing company because their software is able to learn our habits, our interests and our actvities. This information is extremely valuable to companies who want to sell products and services. Google collects this information with free software like Picasa, Gmail etc. Data is what Google sells so the more they collect and better the quality, the more money Google makes. Goolge is not in the buiness of selling software, they're in the business of selling data.
ayottesoftware.com
everybody knows that linux ppl are so pretentious they would never be caught dead running a closed source app (which I'm sure this is going to be). there are alternative photo apps out there that are open source, so why would anyone use this? props to google for extending to the linux crowd, but i think they're wasting their time.
where's the news?? I've been using wine to run Picasa for over a year now. Wine has become quite good over the last few years, all I had to do is download the Picasa install file and open it with wine. Picasa installed with no problems, I put a link to it on my desktop, and now it runs as if I were on Windows. Problem solved.
I haven't tried yet, but I'm sure Earth will run just as smoothly.
The defunct Alpha, PPC, MIPS and Itanium(*) versions of Windows were all little-endian. It is IMHO extremely unlikely that a large codebase developed on Windows can ever be just compiled on a big-endian system.
(*) OK, some people consider this one still alive.
NO WAI!
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
Picasa is more like iPhoto for Windows (and now linux, even though it is just running under wine).
Sig: I stole this sig.
Corel released WPO 2K with wine and it proved to be a real PITA. It was slow, it was unstable, it took a while for wine to load, it would only run on a specific version of Linux, etc. They DID make major contributions to Wine to allow them to ship WPO2K, but it still was unstable. We purchases several boxed versions (still have them), but went back to WP8 (and still use it for legacy docs).
However, that was several years ago. Wine has come a LONG way, but I still would ask the following about a product shipping with Wine versus a native application (e.g., Mozilla/Firefox):
I realise that wine in general is not cross-architecture because it runs the application on the native processor, but seeing as how google have the source code, will they be able to make it run on PPC and Sparc?
Google has a well deserved reuputation for releaseing apps quickly and efficiently. Having developers port and maintain three different versions of the same program would slow them down. This is why using Wine is a perfect solution for them. They can skip much of the porting issues to quickly and easily release a linux version of their program. It makes sense for Google to contribute to Wine. I personally believe they're all for Linux as long as it doesn't slow them down with other projects too much. I love Linux but we can't blame them. Until the Roman, whoops, I mean Windows Empire is weakened a bit we can expect more of the same. Here's hoping Wine is improved this next year as much as it was last year.
I have been using Crossover Office for years and it is not painful, although it costs just a bit.
They have a great automatic installer for various office components and tons of other stuff (like browser plugins and fonts and other garbage).
It is worth the $40 they charge so you have 100% compatability with office docs. Office 2000 works fairly well on a decent machine, but I haven't tried XP.
In some cases, after an update my XP laptop garfs on ppt presentations, while wine on my linux box running powerpnt runs just fine. Funny that I have to move
So they just compiled it against winelib? Why do I get the feeling this will be like that god-awful Solaris version of Rational Rose I had to use in a CS course last year, that tries to be its own window manager? If I wanted a half-assed solution like this I could just run it in wine myself.
No thanks.
Everyone is born right-handed; only the greatest overcome it
Google already has their sticky fingers in enough pies, what with their desktop search and google earth, and their planned file indexing and transfer "service". I am glad there are no linux apps from google, because it makes linux still safer from the "mainstream". Wasn't there a nice windows vulnerability facilitated by the google toolbar/desktop search a little while ago. Oh, yeah, the wmf debacle.
While I don't believe in security by obscurity, I do like to keep my stuff , my stuff ! I am not interested in having google poke around in my machine (even with restricted privileges).
They should have stayed as a simple search engine, ie web based. They have no business on my hardware. Especially as it's going to be closed source so no-one can take a look and test it for problems. I must add that I do use closed source software such as the nvidia drivers and I was using linuxant driverloader wifi drivers (and custom kernel) for a while through neccessity, which I payed for. I would have payed for them even if they had been open source, because they were worth it to me at the time. I am not a complete leech.
But, back OT, google can keep their crap. It's only a way for them to gather more data with which to woo advertising revenue. And as many people say about the MPAA and RIAA, they exist to provide us with a service, we owe them nothing in return. I have no desire to be part of googles ever expanding ad-farm.
Thanks. (but no thanks)
No one is shoving anything down your throat. There are alternatives to buying products "Made in China". Is it hard work to find alternatives? Is it more expensive? Probably... But, it's possible.
Practice what you preach.
I was one of the original developers on Picasa. Two things you might want to know. One: a LOT of Picasa, particularly the main UI code, makes extremely light use of the Win32 apis. Two: If you check the WINE logs in the last while, you'll see a lot of beneficial commits coming from Google employees. Some of these were directly inspired by Picasa, which *does* make use of some of Windows' more obscure APIs that WINE didn't have full support for initially.
Personally, I think google talk is the nicest IM client I've ever used. Every little thing about it is done right.
Like to know when someone IMed you but don't want timestamps cluttering up your conversations? It will insert subtle timestamps in any long pause in the conversation.
Don't like multiple chat windows cluttering up your screen, but don't want to embarass yourself? Google talk's stackable shadable windows are just the thing.
You get the idea. Every single part of the interface seems like an ingenious compromise between the pros and cons of features that other IM clients have tried.
hahahahah... google has thrown the OSS community a bone. a dry one. reminds me of my courtship years trying to impress every girl on the block.
yahoo!! is the champ in dog-bone business, rolling out leftovers and rotting apples disguised as dish... hahahah
Picasa2 already runs on Linux very well -- under Wine. Default install of wine is able to install and run Picasa2. The only bummer is sending pictures by email. None of the email options seem to work.
Google Earth is the important one. Google Talk too, but they've released code for GAIM and seem to be trying not to split the Linux IM market any further. Picassa isn't a big deal though, considering that we have Digikam.
I appreciate that Google isn't completely ignoring those who don't choose Microsoft, but I'm amazed that a modern global internet company would write software that is so tightly coupled to a single proprietery OS. A tightly coupled hack to get it working on a particular Linux dist isn't much better. It will go stale within months. Unsustainable... and evil.
PPC is big endian.
I think more of you should try Picasa. It's a really excellent photo organizer. Is it the only one? No. But it's way better than iPhoto (lightyears faster and doesn't steal your images and store them in a bunch of terrible date labeled folders).
Not saying this is a huge deal for linux, but as a mac user, I certainly would love ot have Picasa instead of iphoto, so at the very least it's one more nice option for linux users.
Oh Jesus fucking Christ. When I read the title I immediately thought about google earth for linux. wtf.
It sounds more like it will be supported like a closed source application without a typical vendor's motivation to keep paying customers happy.
At the end of the day, crap that doesn't cost you anything is still crap.
Right, if you can stand the ugly-ass X11 interface and install all the required libraries to compile it (or use Fink, whatever). The point is, many of the native MacOS X apps that use the Aqua interface are shareware because that's the kind of licensing that the MacOS Classic developers were used to. You could put out some rinky-dink calculator app for MacOS 8 and slap on a $25 shareware fee. I don't know if anyone actually paid the fee, but they sure tried to sell the stuff.
Good lord, what a massive concentration of stupidity. pair-a-splat splats again!
Google chat in https mode is working now for me (not sure if it's for everyone but I assume it is), so you might be able to go back to using it. I did, I much prefer having a https connection to gmail.