You may just have solved the issue for me. In the link, you link to ~/.wine/dosdevices- I missed the.wine part...
I'll be giving this a try- if I can get around this issue, I may be able to finally abandon Windows completely...
You are right- I am attempting to utilize a serial to usb converter, which works fine with Linux, and works fine under VirtualBox with Windows 98SE guest (Specifically, a Keyspan 19HS). I have not been able to get it to function in Wine. I have gone through all the procedures for linking serial ports to Wine, I have tried the old work-around that shows up on the Wine site, and I have not been able to get Wine to recognize the port. The legacy software I am trying to preserve (all of which functions well in VB with Win 98SE) involves drivers, parsers and converters for proprietary data structures from equipment no longer supported by the manufacturer. I have on occasion be able to work around this by snooping the data stream and developing my own parsers and converters (sing Excel in VB- haven't got it working in Wine), but one must know the communications protocol and data structure and have a lot of time for experimentation. We are talking about maintaining the utility of legacy equipment that amounts to several thousand dollars worth of investment that still functions properly and serves my needs. Replacing the older equipment for newer equipment that only marginally expands the capabilities that I use just does not make sense.
I use Wine for a number of applications, and find it better, in most cases than VB, from the standpoint of speed, mostly. I especially like Excel 2000 on Wine, which has capabilities not available in OpenOffice Calc or any other OpenSource spreadsheet I have looked at (specifically, FFT capabilities- and the graphics are a whole lot faster).
If you have a solution that can give me access to the usb to serial converter through Wine, I would be most greatful. The solution provided in the documentation does not work in my setup. I am not making derogatory comments about Wine- I am trying to encourage the expansion of its capabilities to enhance its utility for my applications. I have posted very similar comments on the Wine site directly, and the response has been that usb support is a low-profile issue for the Wine developers.
"If you want to run Windows apps, why not use Windows?"
Because these apps that are important to me don't run in newer Windows versions...And Microsoft in all it's wisdom sees no need to insure backward capability...
Since the only reason I need Windows apps is to preserve legacy software for which I can find no replacement for (i.e., "ancient" data acquisition hardware for which the manufacturers no longer provide support), Wine is a good solution, except for one fault- no usb support. Since newer computers are coming without traditional com ports, usb support is critical. That dictates that one must use VirtualBox or some other virtual system with Windows installed. Wine works better, requires less tweaking to get things up and running, and generally runs applications faster than most of the virtual machines i have played with...
I agree with much of what you say- we could be doing better than we are. What I have trouble with is the fallacy in the concept that the rich are getting richer while the poor are getting poorer. If this were true, we would still be living under the Sumerians, or, possibly, under their predecessors, about whom we know nothing. Ghengis Khan, a poor nomad, would never have ascended to the throne of Imperial China. Comparing today to the 1990's will mislead. One needs a historical perspective. Not many years ago, the US was a third world agrarian society, while England was the most powerful and wealthiest nation. They were preceded by the Spanish, who were preceded by the Portuguese, who were preceded by the Hansianic League, who were preceded by the Italian City States, who could not compete in wealth with the Ottoman Empire, which had displaced the Romans and the Persians and the Greeks, ad infinitum. Within our own society, extreme wealth rarely extends beyond the third generation. Bill Gates is not descended from the superwealthy, nor is President Obama...Many of the superwealthy of the past (Carnegie and the Kennedy's among them) started as poor immigrants. When one tries to "redistribute" wealth from the rich to the poor artificially, one generally finds that the poor "consume" what they receive immediately, rather than utilizing the windfall to advance their station in life. Focusing one's attention only on the immediate past limits and distorts one's perspective on the dynamics of wealth and power...
"The rich get richer
The poor get poorer"
This fallacy is inconsistent with the facts. Compare the wealth and power of the industrial magnates of the 1890's in the US with the wealth and power of today's wealthiest (i.e., Bill Gates and Warren Buffett). Back in the 1890's, a single individual (I believe it was a Rockerfeller, but that may not be correct) could pay off the entire US national debt from personal resources. How many of our wealthy citizens would have to pool their resources to pay off the current national debt? 120 years ago, the wealthy had sufficient power to run their businesses as they saw fit (albeit in many cases, in accordance with questionable moral practices). Today, the wealthy need government permission to sneeze.
The poor getting poorer? In the 1950's, growing up in a "middle class" family in the United States, we did not have air conditioning or an automobile, nor did my parents own their own home- but we always were able to rent quality housing (no leaky roof, no broken windows, well heated in the winter). But we were not poor- we ate well, attended good public schools, dressed well, attended the movies on a regular basis...We did not have a television (mostly because one needed a tower about 120 feet high to receive a signal in the rural area where we lived). Today, when I visit poor neighborhoods, I am struck by the number of cars parked outside the tenements, by the number of televisions and boom box stereos blaring from the broken windows, by the number of people talking on cell phones or walking about with earbuds stuck in their ears (true, one can not tell if these are really attached to a working IPod...). And this in in a "Third World" country. But, most tellingly, in most of the world, the life expectancy of the poorer elements of the society has increased dramatically over the past 100 years. I fail to see how one can claim that the poor are getting poorer...
I have never purchased a computer based on the operating system offered. In the past ten years, I have generally not used the operating system originally provided with the computers I have purchased. With the exception of laptop computers, I see no difference in the price of a computer I build myself, without an integrated operating system, and a commercial offering of the same capabilities with an integrated operating system. Ergo, the operating system really has no value. If ASUS or any other provider wants to offer me $6 for something I know I won't use, I will accept their money. But, if Toshiba offers me the capabilities I am looking for, for a price I consider reasonable, then I do not care whether I am paying for a Microsoft operating system or not. As soon as I turn on the computer, the first command is usually, format c:\" anyway- I am buying hardware, not software....Arguing over $6 today is not the same as arguing over $6 back in the days when gasoline was $0.15 per gallon....
Actually, I have been synching data between operating systems (Linux and Windows only, I haven't had a call to do this with OsX yet). I use my old Palm E2 with Palm OS5, hot synch with each computer in turn. Documents, spreadsheets, calendar, phone book, expenses, etc. I don't even have to think about where I last worked on a particular file- HotSync takes care of that. It is a shame newer technology can not accomplish the same tasks that were trivial a couple of years ago...
I work in a tropical humid environment, a good deal of my work taking me away from "civilization" out into the jungle where the only power available may be that which I carry with me. I carry a very cheap Acer throw-away laptop into the jungle with me. It runs Xubuntu and Windows XP, dual boot. Pretty much handles everything I need in the jungle. Includes WiFi, but where am I going to find a WiFi hotspot 120 miles from the nearest road? In fact, I can not always count on a sattelite connection, so often I am without Internet. Back in civilization, I have a couple of conventional desktops, running various operating systems, and this is where I back up everything when I return from the jungle. These, too, survive well without air conditioning. The power supply is much more reliable in the city, but still occassionally flakey. Every 5 years or so, I have to replace a hard drive or a power supply (or both). I find the most cost-effective approach is to buy "throw away" hardware, and have spares and a good backup strategy...
Does this mean it is time to start looking for a new distro to replace Ubuntu, since Canonical is so obviously intent on joining the mainstream corporate universe???
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You may just have solved the issue for me. In the link, you link to ~/.wine/dosdevices- I missed the .wine part...
I'll be giving this a try- if I can get around this issue, I may be able to finally abandon Windows completely...
You are right- I am attempting to utilize a serial to usb converter, which works fine with Linux, and works fine under VirtualBox with Windows 98SE guest (Specifically, a Keyspan 19HS). I have not been able to get it to function in Wine. I have gone through all the procedures for linking serial ports to Wine, I have tried the old work-around that shows up on the Wine site, and I have not been able to get Wine to recognize the port. The legacy software I am trying to preserve (all of which functions well in VB with Win 98SE) involves drivers, parsers and converters for proprietary data structures from equipment no longer supported by the manufacturer. I have on occasion be able to work around this by snooping the data stream and developing my own parsers and converters (sing Excel in VB- haven't got it working in Wine), but one must know the communications protocol and data structure and have a lot of time for experimentation. We are talking about maintaining the utility of legacy equipment that amounts to several thousand dollars worth of investment that still functions properly and serves my needs. Replacing the older equipment for newer equipment that only marginally expands the capabilities that I use just does not make sense. I use Wine for a number of applications, and find it better, in most cases than VB, from the standpoint of speed, mostly. I especially like Excel 2000 on Wine, which has capabilities not available in OpenOffice Calc or any other OpenSource spreadsheet I have looked at (specifically, FFT capabilities- and the graphics are a whole lot faster). If you have a solution that can give me access to the usb to serial converter through Wine, I would be most greatful. The solution provided in the documentation does not work in my setup. I am not making derogatory comments about Wine- I am trying to encourage the expansion of its capabilities to enhance its utility for my applications. I have posted very similar comments on the Wine site directly, and the response has been that usb support is a low-profile issue for the Wine developers.
"If you want to run Windows apps, why not use Windows?" Because these apps that are important to me don't run in newer Windows versions...And Microsoft in all it's wisdom sees no need to insure backward capability...
GnuCash broke me of the Peachtree habit. I suspect it could break you of the QuickBooks habit as well...
Since the only reason I need Windows apps is to preserve legacy software for which I can find no replacement for (i.e., "ancient" data acquisition hardware for which the manufacturers no longer provide support), Wine is a good solution, except for one fault- no usb support. Since newer computers are coming without traditional com ports, usb support is critical. That dictates that one must use VirtualBox or some other virtual system with Windows installed. Wine works better, requires less tweaking to get things up and running, and generally runs applications faster than most of the virtual machines i have played with...
I agree with much of what you say- we could be doing better than we are. What I have trouble with is the fallacy in the concept that the rich are getting richer while the poor are getting poorer. If this were true, we would still be living under the Sumerians, or, possibly, under their predecessors, about whom we know nothing. Ghengis Khan, a poor nomad, would never have ascended to the throne of Imperial China. Comparing today to the 1990's will mislead. One needs a historical perspective. Not many years ago, the US was a third world agrarian society, while England was the most powerful and wealthiest nation. They were preceded by the Spanish, who were preceded by the Portuguese, who were preceded by the Hansianic League, who were preceded by the Italian City States, who could not compete in wealth with the Ottoman Empire, which had displaced the Romans and the Persians and the Greeks, ad infinitum. Within our own society, extreme wealth rarely extends beyond the third generation. Bill Gates is not descended from the superwealthy, nor is President Obama...Many of the superwealthy of the past (Carnegie and the Kennedy's among them) started as poor immigrants. When one tries to "redistribute" wealth from the rich to the poor artificially, one generally finds that the poor "consume" what they receive immediately, rather than utilizing the windfall to advance their station in life. Focusing one's attention only on the immediate past limits and distorts one's perspective on the dynamics of wealth and power...
"The rich get richer The poor get poorer" This fallacy is inconsistent with the facts. Compare the wealth and power of the industrial magnates of the 1890's in the US with the wealth and power of today's wealthiest (i.e., Bill Gates and Warren Buffett). Back in the 1890's, a single individual (I believe it was a Rockerfeller, but that may not be correct) could pay off the entire US national debt from personal resources. How many of our wealthy citizens would have to pool their resources to pay off the current national debt? 120 years ago, the wealthy had sufficient power to run their businesses as they saw fit (albeit in many cases, in accordance with questionable moral practices). Today, the wealthy need government permission to sneeze. The poor getting poorer? In the 1950's, growing up in a "middle class" family in the United States, we did not have air conditioning or an automobile, nor did my parents own their own home- but we always were able to rent quality housing (no leaky roof, no broken windows, well heated in the winter). But we were not poor- we ate well, attended good public schools, dressed well, attended the movies on a regular basis...We did not have a television (mostly because one needed a tower about 120 feet high to receive a signal in the rural area where we lived). Today, when I visit poor neighborhoods, I am struck by the number of cars parked outside the tenements, by the number of televisions and boom box stereos blaring from the broken windows, by the number of people talking on cell phones or walking about with earbuds stuck in their ears (true, one can not tell if these are really attached to a working IPod...). And this in in a "Third World" country. But, most tellingly, in most of the world, the life expectancy of the poorer elements of the society has increased dramatically over the past 100 years. I fail to see how one can claim that the poor are getting poorer...
I have never purchased a computer based on the operating system offered. In the past ten years, I have generally not used the operating system originally provided with the computers I have purchased. With the exception of laptop computers, I see no difference in the price of a computer I build myself, without an integrated operating system, and a commercial offering of the same capabilities with an integrated operating system. Ergo, the operating system really has no value. If ASUS or any other provider wants to offer me $6 for something I know I won't use, I will accept their money. But, if Toshiba offers me the capabilities I am looking for, for a price I consider reasonable, then I do not care whether I am paying for a Microsoft operating system or not. As soon as I turn on the computer, the first command is usually, format c:\" anyway- I am buying hardware, not software....Arguing over $6 today is not the same as arguing over $6 back in the days when gasoline was $0.15 per gallon....
Actually, I have been synching data between operating systems (Linux and Windows only, I haven't had a call to do this with OsX yet). I use my old Palm E2 with Palm OS5, hot synch with each computer in turn. Documents, spreadsheets, calendar, phone book, expenses, etc. I don't even have to think about where I last worked on a particular file- HotSync takes care of that. It is a shame newer technology can not accomplish the same tasks that were trivial a couple of years ago...
I work in a tropical humid environment, a good deal of my work taking me away from "civilization" out into the jungle where the only power available may be that which I carry with me. I carry a very cheap Acer throw-away laptop into the jungle with me. It runs Xubuntu and Windows XP, dual boot. Pretty much handles everything I need in the jungle. Includes WiFi, but where am I going to find a WiFi hotspot 120 miles from the nearest road? In fact, I can not always count on a sattelite connection, so often I am without Internet. Back in civilization, I have a couple of conventional desktops, running various operating systems, and this is where I back up everything when I return from the jungle. These, too, survive well without air conditioning. The power supply is much more reliable in the city, but still occassionally flakey. Every 5 years or so, I have to replace a hard drive or a power supply (or both). I find the most cost-effective approach is to buy "throw away" hardware, and have spares and a good backup strategy...
Does this mean it is time to start looking for a new distro to replace Ubuntu, since Canonical is so obviously intent on joining the mainstream corporate universe???