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Google Windows Apps Coming To Linux

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the google's-root-getting-stronger dept.

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.'"

68 of 298 comments (clear)

  1. Google earth?? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Google earth on linux please!

    1. Re:Google earth?? by Ma�djeurtam · · Score: 2, Informative

      Isn't Google Earth using Qt (and OpenGL, of course)? It would make the Wine step completely useless, since Qt works natively on Linux. And so does OpenGL.

      I believe it's using Qt, at least in its OS X version, because when Google Earth beta for Mac was issued a few months ago, there were lots of complains that it just didn't "feel" like a Mac app, and the reason for this was it was using Qt instead of one of Apple's toolkits.

      --
      Instant Karma's gonna get you, Gonna knock you right on the head (John Lennon, 1970)
    2. Re:Google earth?? by V_Pundit · · Score: 2, Interesting

      It really is too bad they're starting with Picasa. Nothing against Picasa, it does its job, but it is about the easiest Google app to forget about when I want to do the same things on Linux. Google Earth would be a better choice, or Google Talk so that I can voice chat with my family while I am away. Picasa just doesn't do anything really new on Linux.

      --
      that's how I see it anyway . . .
  2. Who'd have guessed? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Google? Beta? Who'd have guessed?

  3. Wine Source Code Patching by EdMcMan · · Score: 5, Interesting

    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).

    1. Re:Wine Source Code Patching by bomek · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Few years ago, A beta version of Canvas from Deneba (a vector graphic application ) was available until they cancelled the project.

    2. Re:Wine Source Code Patching by CyricZ · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Borland used Wine to port their Delphi IDE to Linux a while back. It didn't work out well, and that's part of the reason why Kylix is not longer being developed.

      --
      Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
    3. Re:Wine Source Code Patching by tabrisnet · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Plus there was Corel Office 2000, tho I'm not sure that they ever _finished_ that project. Meanwhile, Corel made a lot of contributions to WINE during that timeframe.

    4. Re:Wine Source Code Patching by aug24 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      AFAIK, the entire API of wine is provided in the WineLib headers, which means that windows source can be statically compiled against it (assuming all the APIs you want are there which is mostly true now).

      Usually however, people don't have the windows source, so the runtime implementations are used and the calls become dynamic. There's the same code behind of course.

      There should be a Wine expert along shortly to point out the gross over-simplification in what I've just said ;-)

      Justin.

      --
      You're only jealous cos the little penguins are talking to me.
    5. Re:Wine Source Code Patching by dilvish_the_damned · · Score: 2, Interesting

      IBM has used it, oh, and loki used it (I think), I think what your looking for is a mainstream application being ported to *nix using Wine, it has been done from mainstream vendors on a sort of 'trial' basis, but never advertised. It has been done in the past and then the products have always died a more silent death with less noise than they were born.
      On the other hand, I would hardly call this a mainstream application, even though it comes from a well known corporate vendor.
      I am not normally the pessimist, I just find myself jaded today.
      I wish google all the luck in this.

      --
      I think you underestimate just how much I just dont care.
    6. Re:Wine Source Code Patching by Solder+Fumes · · Score: 2, Insightful

      The reason nobody uses winelib is because it's completely pointless. Using DLLs is just as fast and tends to save a lot of space on your hard drive over static linking.

      Valid, unless you actually want your application to WORK.

    7. Re:Wine Source Code Patching by TangoCharlie · · Score: 2, Interesting

      CorelDraw was ported to Linux using Wine. I had the Beta. It worked OK, but it was rather too slow on my PII @400MHz PC running Linux. At the time, that was a fairly high-spec PC. However, the equivalent Windows version was just fine on a lower-powered PII 266. Since then Wine has come on quite a long way, thanks in part to Corel's efforts and obviously those of CodeWeavers. However, relying on Wine to do your cross-platform development is no substitute for using a "proper" cross-platform toolkit.

      --
      return 0; }
    8. Re:Wine Source Code Patching by Bill+Hayden · · Score: 5, Funny
      There should be a Wine expert along shortly to point out the gross over-simplification in what I've just said ;-)
      I am a WINE expert, and that was a gross-oversimplification.
      --
      Protect your browser with the Force Safe Search add-on
    9. Re:Wine Source Code Patching by aug24 · · Score: 2, Interesting
      I didn't predict there'd be a WINE expert along to point out that my whole post was a gross over-simplification. That's be quite redundant.


      I predicted there'd be a WINE expert along to point out the gross over-simplification. If you can help with that, go right ahead... ;-)


      Justin.

      --
      You're only jealous cos the little penguins are talking to me.
    10. Re:Wine Source Code Patching by tondrej · · Score: 3, Informative

      Although Kylix is named after a Greek wine-drinking cup and the Kylix IDE itself does use WINE, the produced executables do not depend on WINE. The CLX library uses Qt runtime.

      --
      Never send a human to do a machine's job.
  4. Ughhh..... by segedunum · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Wine. So that means their still Windows applications then?

    1. Re:Ughhh..... by makomk · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Wine. So that means their still Windows applications then?

      Sort of. If they're porting it in the usual way, it'll still use the Windows API but will be a Linux ELF binary. (The actual program binary *might* be a shared object, depending on whether CodeWeavers use the standard wineport tools or some custom-developed toolkit of their own).

    2. Re:Ughhh..... by gutnor · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Technically maybe but what is important is that for a linux user it looks like a linux application. It will be supported like a Linux application.
      It is not a hack you need to do and support yourself in the back of the original developer.

      In any cross-platform development you try to limit the difference between different platform source trees, generally you isolate all platform specific functions in a common framework and only port the common framework on different platforms, leaving the rest of code unchanged.
      There are plenty of cross-platform frameworks for plenty of use ( from simply using stdio.h to opengl ), in this case they choosed WINE. That is surprising yes, but that does make sense for a project that need to be crossplatform retroactively.

      You can see that Google apps are still Windows applications but you can see them as using a cross platform framework developped conjointly by Microsoft on Windows and WINE team on Linux :-)

    3. Re:Ughhh..... by MadJo · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I hope they remove references to IE in their 'linux' version:
      http://picasa.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?ans wer=15207

      --
      80 CC D8 AF AE D3 AB 54 B7 2E CE 67 C7
  5. Yuck by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    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.

    1. Re:Yuck by raventh1 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      First: You have to commend them because they are taking any step to cross-platform.
      Second: If any step succeeds, another is likely to be taken.
      Third: Other companies will be watching Google, and they may decide it's worth the time to at least start with wine. A foot in the door may lead to a complete port.

    2. Re:Yuck by lahvak · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It's not going to run "in wine". They are linking it with winelib to make it into a native Linux application without having to completely rewrite it. Winelib provides the interface between Windows API and Linux API. It is similar to porting Unix applications to Windows using Cygwin.

      --
      AccountKiller
    3. Re:Yuck by pjbgravely · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Linux users feel that because Google built their system on Linux that they should give back to the community by porting their closed source apps to Linux. Of course this did not happen and I am sure some people were angry because of it.

      We have to remember that Google does pay for Linux apps through bounties so they are giving something back. I doubt we will see real ports until a killer worm takes out 50% of all Microsoft Windows boxes.

      --
      Star Trek, there maybe hope.
    4. Re:Yuck by alienw · · Score: 2, Insightful

      There is no difference between Winelib and Wine applications. This is a myth. It's about as much of a difference as linking a program statically versus using dynamic libraries. It's not noticeable from the end-user point of view. A winelib app can have just as many bugs and will be just as fast (or slow) as the wine version.

    5. Re:Yuck by jdgreen7 · · Score: 2, Informative
      Do you have any idea how Wine works? It loads PE files and calls into Winelib. Linking to winelib and running through wine are functionally identical. The most stark difference between Cygwin and Wine is that Cygwin is functionally-complete, while Wine is not.

      But this is only a "Good Thing". This will encourage Google to implement any functions that happen to be missing in Wine. I've been working with and learning the codebase of Wine for the last few months, and it's quite solid. The functions are all laid out into separate DLL subfolders and the debugging support is very thorough. It allows you to figure out why your app isn't working fairly easily by usually telling you which function failed.

      The goal of the Wine project is to fully implement the Win32 API on Linux or other Open Source platforms. This has been endlessly debated, but it's generally considered a "Good Thing" as well. This will eventually allow you to run any application that was designed for Windows 95 through XYZ3000 on Linux and eliminate my need for dual-booting to play games. People complain that it will always be playing catch up, but it has really come a long way. The latest version ran Quickbook 99 Professional (the only non-game I had to dual boot for) right out of the box, and I was amazed. When I looked at this project a couple of years ago, it couldn't run anything I threw at it. Most applications you buy today can still be run on Windows 98, and if Wine finishes only Win98 functionality, it will have accomplished tons.

      IMHO, getting Google behind the Wine project is spectacular and will only bring about positive things for the Open Source crowd.

    6. Re:Yuck by hey! · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The most stark difference between Cygwin and Wine is that Cygwin is functionally-complete, while Wine is not.

      However, if you are a developer using it as a compatability library, presumably you test your applications so they perform the way you intend. If a feature doesn't work right, or it's too slow, then you do it a different way. There's always a different way. Generally your first cut is pretty far from what you'd wish on any implementation of any set of APIs, which is why you test in the first place.

      Users trying to run software in which running against WINE are in a completely different position. They're hoping that an app will run well against WINE, even though it has never been tested against it. If it doesn't run well, not having source code they don't have any recourse. Given these unfavorable preconditions, WINE works remarkably well.

      The only reason to use WINE as a developer is to port existing Win32 apps to non-Windows platforms. If you are targetting Unix, or intending Unix/Win32 compatibility from the outset, there are better choices.

      There is no reason in principle porting your app to Win32 using WINE with a bit of testing can't work, but whether it is practical depends on how much tweaking you need to do to make things work well on both platforms. My guess is that most people looking at this choice don't think it is practical. If getting your Win2000 app to work on WINE as as easy as getting it to work on Windows XP, then I'm sure many more people would be eager to make a Linux offering.

      Google has money and is technically innovative. Having a player like this attempt a port of their Win32 app to WINE could be a very interesting development. If they're only going to throw out a half baked version of their closed source Win32 apps, it's hardly important news. But if they contribute back improvements to WINE or create an open source facade that abstracts the differences between the two, it could be very significant.

      --
      Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
  6. Will it be as bad as Kylix? by CyricZ · · Score: 2, Interesting

    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.
  7. Google and "limited beta"? by Opportunist · · Score: 4, Funny

    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.
  8. PPC Linux support? SPARC Linux support? by CyricZ · · Score: 2, Insightful

    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.
  9. This gives me a very odd feeling. by Volanin · · Score: 4, Interesting

    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?
  10. Not a good way to do it, however. by CyricZ · · Score: 2, Insightful

    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.
    1. Re:Not a good way to do it, however. by strider44 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      They were also a long time ago, at least in terms of computers. Wine has come leaps and bounds especially in terms of stability in just the last year. One of the main ideas behind this however is that Google will know which functions are needed, which lightens the set almost immeasurably. This is a relatively small program compared to WordPerfect so all they need to do is ensure those functions they use are stable, and when they want to port another program along they need to expand the set of functions that they need to be stable to incorperate the functions that program needs and do the maintenance job on that.

      They also have the advantage in that they can modify Wine to suit the program and the program to suit Linux should they need it, and advantage that you don't have running Wine on your average computer. They can, for example, rewrite the file loading code to take advantage of the GTK file selecter and grab the files directly from the operating system. They don't *need* to go through the C:\ file system emulation, one of the bigger issues with Wine. They can also probably with small modifications route their audio through GStreamer, cutting out the Wine audio library which is sometimes considered buggy. If a certain section of the program proves buggy, they can simply port that section and do the rest through Wine.

      Seriously, I think if a Linux version of Picasso ends up buggy then it's Google's fault, not Wine.

  11. Quick question... by PinkyDead · · Score: 4, Interesting

    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 :wq!
    1. Re:Quick question... by louden+obscure · · Score: 2, Informative

      go take a peek inside ~/.wine

      --
      Serenity now, insanity later.
  12. Re:transparent crap by hattig · · Score: 2, Interesting

    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!

  13. Headline: by blkros · · Score: 4, Insightful

    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!
  14. People will moan and bitch about more free stuff by valen · · Score: 5, Interesting


      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

  15. Earthiness? by jgrindal · · Score: 2, Interesting

    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!

  16. A hint of things to come? by dhart · · Score: 5, Interesting

    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!

  17. Re:People will moan and bitch about more free stuf by nogginthenog · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I'm just guessing but presumably they make money when you order prints from Picasa? e.g. Kodak pay them a referral fee?

  18. native by goarilla · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I wonder why they just dont make a native port?

    1. Re:native by Yaotzin · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Because they can't be arsed.

      --
      Error: No error occurred
    2. Re:native by moranar · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Because it costs too much money for the potential marketshare gains.

      --
      "I think it would be a good idea!"
      Gandhi, about Internet Security
  19. Re:IBM nah Google. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Right.... because Google sure has a history of producing good client side software... Get a grip people, Google makes the best search engine and a good email interface (IMO it's not even that good but that's another topic). Everything else that they've made has been extremely mediocre at best (Google Video, Google Talk etc.). Saying that they have the ability to make Linux acceptable to the masses more than Sun or IBM, who are two of the worlds biggest open source contributors, is beyond ridiculous.

    Then you go on to say, "the other guys just R & D it". Oh please, it'll be years, if ever, before Google can claim that they've produced a fraction of the amount of Open Source code as IBM and Sun. There is no company that the R & D statement would apply to more than Google. IBM and Sun produce a ton of Open Source code, whereas Google produces almost nothing. These aren't even going to be native Linux apps and several of those apps already work in Wine.

    I love the words you used as well, "Google by some magic". Sheesh...

  20. Cool by bogie · · Score: 2, Informative

    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
    1. Re:Cool by JesterXXV · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The combination of your comment and your sig just made my head explode.

      --
      Yo mama so fake, she failed the Turing Test.
  21. Re:Boneheads by westlake · · Score: 3, Informative
    It's 2006 and Google, one the supposed leading tech companies in the world, is still writing their apps with the Win32 API???

    It is 2006 and win32 is 97% of the market for desktop apps like Picassa.

  22. Re:not another Goomur, but almost... by mikeisme77 · · Score: 4, Informative

    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.
  23. Google Earth by rtos · · Score: 2, Informative
    What people really want isn't to organize their photos with Picasa... they want Google Earth. That's the app that would be extremely cool to have available on Linux.

    Yeah, it already works in Wine, but it would be nice to be able to run it without that.

    --
    -- null
  24. Re:People will moan and bitch about more free stuf by Professor_UNIX · · Score: 2, Insightful

    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.

  25. Re:not another Goomur, but almost... by nursegirl · · Score: 2, Informative

    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.)

  26. Oh goody. Can't wait. by squoozer · · Score: 2, Insightful

    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.
  27. Picasa is NOT a photo editing tool. by rduke15 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    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.

    1. Re:Picasa is NOT a photo editing tool. by Klivian · · Score: 2, Informative

      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.

      And that is what makes Picasa the right applications for the majority of users, since it does fill their limited needs when it comes to photo editing. The average user simply do not need all the functionality you find in the likes of Photoshop/Gimp/PaintShopPro/etc. Using Photoshop/Gimp/PaintShopPro/etc when you only do basic tasks like cropping and redeye removal etc. is just plain stupid. Those users are better of with simpler tools, and if it's included in their photo organizer application it's just a added bonus, like Picasa or DigiKam.

  28. Good for Google. by spicyed · · Score: 2, Insightful

    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).

  29. So... is Wine an emulator? by glug101 · · Score: 2, Funny

    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.

  30. Why do it half assed by TheSkepticalOptimist · · Score: 3, Insightful

    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.
    1. Re:Why do it half assed by WhiteWolf666 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Anything that has to mediate between native software code and native OS/Hardware code is an emulator.

      Are GTK, QT, and Mono emulators?

      Hell, what about XGL and/or Xorg? Or GTK on Win32? What about Cygwin? What about Xen, or VMware, or Java?

      What is an emulator, anyways? What's the difference between "native" and "foreign"? How many layers of translation are okay? What if an app relies on libc? That's "translation" between native (assembly) code and the hardware.

      Your understanding of these things is very, very limited. Emulation can be really fast (VMware), and in any case, Wine is an implementation of Win32 for Unix based systems. That's all; no more, no less. It's not really all that different from the Linux environment for FreeBSD, or even QT/GTK.

      Don't get me wrong, there are speed problems. But these are not design issues, they are implementation issues, and are things that can be solved with programmer time. There is no fundamental design reason why Wine should be slower than Windows; indeed, as long as Linux is faster with the underlying hardware access, Wine can be significantly faster.

      --
      WhiteWolf666 an exBush supporter. All you new-school,compassionate,save the children Republicans can rot in hell
  31. Re:People will moan and bitch about more free stuf by Criterion · · Score: 2, Insightful

    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?
  32. A common problem by Azureflare · · Score: 2, Informative

    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.

  33. Re:IBM nah Google. by salimma · · Score: 2, Informative

    ... and OpenOffice. OK, Sun bought it off a German company (and then graciously open-sourced it), but Google bought off the company that originally wrote Picasa too (surprisingly, Apple did the same for iTunes). Neither are open-source.

    (Though I'd use a Picasa port before I use F-Spot, the latter is still too incosistent for me.)

    --
    Michel
    Fedora Project Contribut
  34. Wordperfect Office 2000 for Linux anyone? by caseih · · Score: 2, Insightful

    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.

  35. No, port WorldWind instead by Russ+Nelson · · Score: 2, Interesting

    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
  36. LOKI did not use wine by rsd · · Score: 2, Informative

    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.

  37. They shouldn't waste their time by panic911 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    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.

  38. NOT just a Windows port by vivarin · · Score: 2, Insightful

    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.

  39. Have you ever used Google Talk? by moultano · · Score: 2, Insightful

    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.

  40. Re:IBM nah Google. by EternityInterface · · Score: 2, Interesting

    They act like it's so difficult and time consuming

    Then there's always selling out. And I don't get the system specs, I mean, all that for basically sizing down images? Did they only buy it because of a cool title?

    --
    the sun is god