Wine
Wine is a WINdows Emulator which allows a Linux user to play windows games and other programs. Free Geek Tech Support does not help with installing or configuring wine, but it can still be a fun and potentially useful project for the geekier minded adopter. Installing is easy from the command line (apt-get install wine) or from Synaptic. Each user on the system needs to configure the installation using winecfg. Programs can be installed or run by opening the exe file in wine.
Wine Application Database: You can check to see if a specific game or program will work on wine by visiting the wine application database . If the program has already been tested by someone it should contain a page with information on how well the game runs and any notes or instructions for getting the game running properly on Linux.
Installing wine
Wine can be installed using the Add/Remove item under the ubuntu Applications menu.
Wine is updated with a new version roughly every 2 weeks. While Ubuntu includes the stable version of wine in its repositories, we reccomend using the latest version available from the offical wine repositories to ensure the best results. Instructions for installing the latest version of wine can be found here.
Installing Windows Programs in wine
wine-doors Is a type package manger for wine that helps assist users in installing some more common windows applications under wine. These programs include Internet Explorer 6, Steam (Half-Life 2, Portal, ect), World Of Warcraft, Windows Media Player, and many others.
For applications not included in wine doors, most windows applications can be installed simply by double clicking on the executable file after wine has been installed. Wine installs programs to a virtual windows drive which can be access by going to the applications menu and selecting wine> Browse Wine Drive. If a program created a desktop icon or start menu item for windows it should be located on your ubuntu desktop and/or under the wine programs menu respectively.
Some tips:
- Programs on multiple cds are often easier to install if you copy all the files on to the hard drive first.
- Many games require high end video cards and the binary drivers for those cards (e.g. NVidia)
- If you want to install the binary drivers for your video card see this page
Video Tutorials
These videos are provided for users who would like a visual reference to the above information.
Installation:
how to setup and install the stable version of wine (easiest) how to install the latest version of wine from winehq.net
Configuration and extra software:
how to setup wine using winecfg how to install wine-doors