Developing Windows applications on Linux? [closed]

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My primary OS is Linux, but now I’m forced to write some C++ applications for Windows. I was thinking about developing on the Linux box with cross platform libraries like WxWidgets (and some care about other platform dependencies) and then cross compiling the result to mingw target.

So the tools I’m thinking of using are

• g++ for compilation and cross-compilation.
• CMake
• WxWidgets
• . for making windows installer packages
• wine for testing of the windows version

And my questions:

What are some free (or even better open source) installers for Windows that I might use to create the final package? It would help if the package could be prepared from Linux.

Will Wine be enough to test the cross compiled version (after all the logic is tested in the Linux version)?

Is this a good idea? 🙂

7 Answers 7

Check Qt too. It’s a very rich cross-platform framework.

As for installers I’d highly recommend WiX.

For testing it will be much better to use some kind of virtualization like Sun Microsystems’s VirtualBox. I believe you could use a trial version of Windows or Windows 7 RC, which is free to use until March 2010.

You imply that the applications are for Windows only and not cross-platform, in which case I think the answer to 3. — This is really not a good idea — trumps the rest.

The reason being you are going to have to extensively test the application under Windows anyway, either directly or in a virtual instance. That being so you’re better to develop under the target OS because you’re more likely to produce a better application — both from catching the bugs earlier and more thoroughly and ensuring your application ‘works’ for your users. I certainly wouldn’t trust just Wine.

I’m not a big fan of cross-platform widgets. Like Java applications you generally end up with something that doesn’t quite look right, and like the uncanny gap that can be enough to make your application smell bad to a large section of your users. Even at the slightly more abstract level, each OS’s applications have a slightly different feel as to how they work and you’ll most likely end up with a Windows application that feels like a, say, KDE one, which will again put your users off.

So yes, certainly possible to do this, but probably not the optimal approach from point of view of the quality of the end product. To do so will give yourself something of a handicap with what you produce and I’d say that’s likely to offset the convenience to you of using a Linux platform. Actually I’d be surprised if you manage even that because I’d bet you’ll spend more time messing around with the widgets trying to fine-tune them so they work right under real Windows than you’ll gain from using an unfamiliar Windows toolset.

How to install Windows applications on Linux using Wine

For various reasons, you may find yourself having to run a Windows program on Linux. It may be that there is no version for Linux, that the version for Windows is better or more professional . or simply your favorite. It may also be that you need to use that program because it is the «standard» of the industry you work in or because no Linux program supports the type of files or documents created with your Windows program on another computer.

Introduction

Before starting with the instructions, I think it necessary to make a brief reflection: once you install Linux there are many ways to run Windows applications, there is even the possibility of installing Windows in a virtual machine, which you can run directly from Linux.

However, Wine is NOT an emulator, as its name says (Wine Is Not an Emulator, hence its acronym). This means that a Windows application that you run with WINE could, in fact there are several recorded cases, run much lighter on Linux than on Windows.

On the other hand, although in some cases it may be convenient to create the happy virtual machine and install our copy of Windows and then our program in it, this can also be a problem. First of all, because of the enormous amount of resources (disk space, memory and processor) that this process would consume. Second, Windows is not free software, and to install it, you are supposed to have a genuine version. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be escaping the patent problem with Windows.

To learn a little more about Wine, I recommend you read its Documentation, the Wiki, the How-To for Beginners and the document «Debunking Common Myths Related to Wine«.

Install Wine

In the download section you can find the latest Wine packages for other popular Linux distributions such as Mandriva, Slackware, Debian, OpenSUSE, etc.

Run and install Windows programs

Once installed, Wine will run when you double-click on any .EXE file. In addition, it will allow you to install programs, as if you were in Windows and it will put the shortcuts in the main menu under the category «Wine».

Despite what many people believe, Wine is used not only to run «simple» Windows applications, but even complex games. What’s more, it has been proven that terrible games like Sim 3, Half Life 2, Command & Conquer 3, Star Wars: Jedi Knight, or important suites like Microsoft Office work perfectly.

It won’t let me run my program / installer! Sniff sniff…

As I suppose you are aware, Linux is a system that is managed through privileges granted to users. This allows only certain users to do certain things. The same goes for files. By default, no .EXE file downloaded from the internet is «executable», until the user indicates otherwise.

If when trying to run the file you see this message:

Then all you have to do is right click on the file. I chose the Properties option. Once there, go to the Permissions tab and enable the Allow the file to run as a program option:

I have other problems running my program

In case the application in question does not run as it should or has problems, I recommend entering the Wine Applications Database to see the comments of other users and their experience running that program using the different versions of Wine. Each installed and tested program has a ranking. If the program you are looking for does not appear in the list, it is a good opportunity to collaborate and upload your impressions.

Uninstall programs in Wine

This is very easy. Go to Applications> Wine> Uninstall Wine software.

From there you will be able to easily remove the installed program. You can also install new programs using this tool, although it may be easier simply by double clicking on the installer in your file explorer or directly from the download window of your internet explorer.

Where is everything installed?
By default, all programs will try to install themselves on your C disk. The question is, what is my C disk? Where are all the files corresponding to the Windows applications installed with Wine actually stored? The answer is simple:

/ .wine / drive_c. That is, in your home there is a hidden folder called .wine in which all the files on your disk C are stored. Actually, as you can see, it is simply a folder that Wine calls «Disk C».

Remember that you can always install your programs in other locations. This is especially useful if you have little space on the disk or partition where you have Linux or your Home folder installed.

Configure Wine

I am afraid of viruses

It is not fair that Windows users get all the fun, as everyone knows Linux viruses practically do not exist. Some time ago, there was a kind of experiment to run windows viruses on Linux with wine.

5 of the most harmful viruses tested (Klez, My Doom, Sobig, SCO Worm, Some Fool) and the results are not very encouraging, none were able to spread and also only one could affect the linux operating system itself.

In summary, you do not lose security by running Windows applications using Wine, on the contrary, you will be much safer than if you ran that same application in Windows.

Winetricks

Sometimes installing a Windows application on Linux using Wine can be a difficult task, especially since some of them require external libraries.

Winetricks is a quick and easy script to download and install these redistributable libraries that are sometimes needed for everything to work wonderfully.

How do you install?

How do I run it?
Once you have obtained Winetricks you can use it by typing in the terminal:

If you run it without parameters, a winetricks screen shows a GUI with a list of available packages. If you know the name of the package (s) you want to install, you can add the name (s) to the Winetricks command line and immediately start the installation process. For example,

This will install both corefonts and vcrun6 packages.

Wine-Doors

Wine-Doors is an excellent little program that allows you to install very popular Windows applications easily and without problems. This saves you from having to google to see what configuration to use, etc.

To install it, you just have to go to the download section of the official website and choose the package that works best for your Linux distribution.

An example: uTorrent using Wine

No i use Transmission or the incredible Deluge. If you didn’t try them, please do so. But, just to show what a Windows application looks like in Ubuntu using Wine, here is a screenshot using uTorrent.

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Full path to article: From Linux » FileLet’s UseLinux » How to install Windows applications on Linux using Wine

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WHERE IS THE LINK TO DOWNLOAD

There is no download link! It is through the use of your terminal that you will do everything.

Hello, can I install a webcam and its drivers in wine? is that only that camera is compatible with window XP, Me, 2000, and 98 the model of the camera is slim usb2 videocam. I already tried to connect it in Ubuntu 14.04 and I could not just turn on the red light the only one that Ubuntu detects is my integrated camera of the lap but I want to connect my external genius camera I can do it with wine

Hello! Look, in my experience, the problem is not your webcam, but Wine does not bring support for USB devices . there are some ways to support some devices but they are not easy.
Can’t use the webcam directly on Linux (without running a windows app with wine)? It seems to me that the solution is more on that side .
A hug! Paul.

the safest thing is that your Web-Cam works plug & play in your Ubuntu, so you do not need any installation CD. just try to run it with the latest Ubuntu Version 16.04 or 17.04 (which has a fairly updated kernel).

In the event that it does not work with these current versions, I recommend resigning . since the device is very old (if it did not receive support in linux until now, I think it never will).

On the other hand, as you mentioned, the webcam also lost support for the current versions of Windows, so it may be time to buy a new Webcam.

Thus, for the next Webcam purchase, keep in mind to acquire a Webcam with Linux support… which will guarantee that your device will have guaranteed support for several decades to come.

HELLO FRIENDS HOW MANY ARE FOLLOWERS OF THIS SITE

Hello, I ask you a question. I have mandriva 2011 and wine 1.3.2.4 is installed. I can’t run any application. nor does the wine open. It may be that the package is not installed correctly? What do you recommend me to try?

Hello, install wine, I want to run a prog called esword and I get the following error: «run-time error» 429 «: activex component can’t create objet». Can someone tell me how to fix it. Thank you

hello I have problems in ubuntu with this error . Error: 429 — ActiveX component can’t create object can you help me please. I don’t know what happened, soz new to this.

or visual studio, I know that sounds funny, but is it possible?

or visual studio I know that sounds funny, but it is possible.

You can emulate a program like sonar 8.

I am very new to linox, I have fedora 17 and installed wine to open internet explorer since I need it to open a particular page, but it is not clear to me how to use it, you can explain something like «how to open internet explorer in wine for dummies» hahaha they would save my life thanks

you can download mozilla and run it directly on linux

Thank you very much, your explanation is very clear

You’re welcome! Hug!
Pablo.

I loved your guide, thank you very much for sharing your experience 😀

Thanks, it helped me with the Winetricks installation, this part was missing in the wine program.

When I hit the permissions tab, it tells me that it is read-only system (CDROM) and I can’t install it. What I do?

Hello Alejandro! I would tell you to try the solution that I give in the section «It won’t let me run my program / installer! Sniff, sniff . »of this post.

Of course it is possible. What’s more, my experience tells me that they work better than non-portable programs.
Hug! Paul.

Hello, could you tell me if a portable program can be run in wine .. Thank you very much

One question, I have xubuntu and it won’t let me run it, but I don’t see the option to allow the file to run as a program, the file is autorun.exe

Hi Pablo, thanks again.
Yes, if I have done this what you say and also the permissions as far as the file dialog box gives. Tell you also that wine opens for me and in the tab »C» is where I try to open the file (I have installed the opensuse on an external hard drive and the win-XP, on the netbook hard drive), but it tells me that there is no windows program installed to open the file (the internet explorer has managed to open it, that is). The problem I have is that I need to install the drivers and controllers of the netbook because, for example, the wif does not work for me in suse (even if the options of the netbook CD, it automatically detects the installed operating system, including linux, but the CD does not run I can’t even open it.) Nothing else at the moment.
A greeting.

You tested by right clicking on the file and choosing the option to open with… Wine.
Cheers!! Paul.
On 12/12/2011 13:59, «Disqus» <>
wrote:

Thank you very much it helped me a lot, I was finally able to use wine with some programs that gave me problems

That good! I’m very glad it served!
Thanks x comment!

Ahh! Now I understand what’s wrong .

The theme is like this:

With Wine you can run simple windows applications without problems. Now, when it comes to running more complex applications, things are a bit more complicated and it is natural that this is the case. To run Word, it is not enough to run the Word .exe that you have on the Windows partition (basically because Word runs a lot of other things at the same time and saves settings in the Windows Registry, etc.). What to do then? Well, you have to install Word using Wine and then, yes, run Word.
In other words, Wine is not going to help you run the applications that you already have installed on the Windows partition (unless they are very simple or so-called «portable» applications). What you have to do is install the application (the .EXE installer will work fine with WINE) and install the program as if it were a Windows application . only that it will install it in your / home / your_user folder /.wine.

Was the difference clear? I hope I have been as «didactic» as possible.
Cheers! Paul.

Thank you It served me a lot thank you

Here are some libraries that bring the winetricks art2kmin MS Access 2000 runtime. License required!
colorprofile Standard RGB color profile
comctl32 MS common controls 5.80
comctl32.ocx MS comctl32.ocx and mscomctl.ocx, comctl32 wrappers for VB6
corefonts MS Arial, Courier, Times fonts
dcom98 MS DCOM, override the Wine implementation
dirac0.8 the obsolete Dirac 0.8 directshow filter
directx9 MS DirectX 9 user redistributable
divx divx video codec
dotnet11 MS .NET 1.1 (requires Windows license)
dotnet20 MS .NET 2.0 (requires Windows license)
ffdshow ffdshow video codecs
flash Adobe Flash Player ActiveX and firefox plugins
fontfix Fix bad fonts which cause crash in some apps (eg .net).
gdiplus MS gdiplus.dll (from powerpoint viewer)
gecko The HTML rendering Engine (Mozilla)
icodecs Intel Codecs (Indeo)
jet40 MS Jet 4.0 Service Pack 8
liberation Red Hat Liberation fonts (Sans, Serif, Mono)
mdac25 MS MDAC 2.5: Microsoft ODBC drivers, etc.
mdac27 MS MDAC 2.7
mdac28 MS MDAC 2.8
mfc40 MS mfc40 (Microsoft Foundation Classes from Visual C ++ 4)
mfc42 MS mfc42 (see vcrun6 below)
mono19 mono-1.9.1-gtksharp-2.10.4-win32-2
msi2 MS Installer 2.0
msls31 MS Line Services 3.1 (needed by native riched?)
msxml3 MS XML version 3
msxml4 MS XML version 4
msxml6 MS XML version 6
ogg ogg filters / codecs: flac, theora, speex, vorbis, schroedinger
pdh MS pdh.dll (Performance Data Helper)
quicktime72 Apple Quicktime 7.2
riched20 MS riched20 and riched32
riched30 MS riched30
tahoma MS Tahoma font (not part of corefonts)
vb3run MS Visual Basic 3 runtime
vb4run MS Visual Basic 4 runtime
vb5run MS Visual Basic 5 runtime
vb6run MS Visual Basic 6 runtime
vcrun6 MS Visual C ++ 6 sp4 libraries (mfc42, msvcp60, msvcrt)
vcrun2003 MS Visual C ++ 2003 libraries (mfc71, msvcp71, msvcr71)
vcrun2005 MS Visual C ++ 2005 libraries (mfc80, msvcp80, msvcr80)
vcrun2005sp1 MS Visual C ++ 2005 sp1 libraries
vcrun2008 MS Visual C ++ 2008 libraries (mfc90, msvcp90, msvcr90)
vjrun20 MS Visual J # 2.0 libraries (requires dotnet20)
wmp9 MS Windows Media Player 9 (requires Windows license)
wmp10 MS Windows Media Player 10 (requires Windows license)
wsh51 MS Windows Scripting Host 5.1
wsh56 MS Windows Scripting Host 5.6
wsh56js MS Windows scripting 5.6, jscript only, no cscript
wsh56vb MS Windows scripting 5.6, vbscript only, no cscript
xvid xvid video codec
Apps:
autohotkey Autohotkey (open source gui scripting language)
firefox3 Firefox Version 3
kde KDE for Windows installer
mpc Media Player Classic
vlc VLC media player
Pseudopackages:
allfonts All listed fonts (corefonts, tahoma, liberation)
allcodecs All listed codecs (xvid, ffdshow, icodecs)
fakeie6 Set registry to claim IE6sp1 is installed
native_mdac Override odbc32 and odbccp32
nt40 Set windows version to nt40
win98 Set windows version to Windows 98
win2k Set windows version to Windows 2000
winxp Set windows version to Windows XP
vista Set windows version to Windows Vista
winver = Set windows version to default (winxp)
volnum Rename drive_c to harddiskvolume0 (needed by some installers)

Remember you can install them with sh winetricks application name

As you well know there is a utility for MS WOS called daemon tools that mounts disk images and emulates security systems, but does not work with wine — that I know — Do you know if there is an alternative to daemon tools for wine that EMULATES THE SYSTEMS OF SECURITY?

Mmmm . not really. There are programs that do something similar to Daemon Tools, but I’m not sure they emulate security systems. What exactly do you mean when you talk about «security systems»?

To the options to emulate Safedisk in its different versions and others
that come in the daemon menu, which now I can’t see because I’ve been 6
months without MS WOS even in emulation.

Come on, if you download a pirate ISO of a game, even if you mount it with
furius, acetone, by commands or whatever will give you an error of
security unless there is a good crack who directly skips it.

I suppose that a web or section dedicated to how to play with ISO images of
games in wine, with the precaution of always starting with «making a
ISO of your original copy »even though we all know it’s a lie, it would have
much success among Maqueros and Linuxeros. That is if you avoid giving links to
torrents directly, that, in any case, if it is difficult for you to do the
ISO copy of your original can be found on another website of
backup downloads.

Of course, finding a gamer, a wine player, or a cracker must
be relatively difficult.
It is easier to directly hack MS WOS and games.

On 18/11/10 23:08 PM, Disqus wrote:

How about . first I want to send congratulations to all the people who promote the use of Linux operating systems, and I say that they promote by all the blogs that have been found in order to solve doubts and show the tools that allow using Linux, especially Ubuntu , and leave behind other operating systems such as Windows and Mac.
Well my question is the following: I have installed Microsoft office with the help of wine, however every time I open a file to modify it with office (and I need it with office because my work team uses it) it asks me for the 25 character password, I put it and then it is impossible for me to open the office because it gets stuck . do you know what I can do? Do you know how I can open an office without asking for the password like everyone else? I have installed office full but the same problem continues .
I would appreciate some advice… thank you very much in advance.

All very well, I have installed a couple of things with wine and they work fine, but now I am trying to install TOAD for Oracle and when I start the TOAD installation screen, I get a window that tells me that I do not have access privileges, that I need to run the program as an administrator, I don’t understand why this happens to me, I have run other things with wine and this has not happened to me, and I don’t see that it has happened to anyone.

Thank you very much, I am going to install the dotnet40 to see if it works for me. Great info, I had been looking for a not very technical explanation of all this for a long time!

Hello friends of Let’s use Linux !!

I am something new to using linux !! I currently use the Ubuntu 10.04 distro and I liked it… I have read and tested the things that it has by itself and I have been learning fast !! I installed wine but I had a small error when I installed a windows program (winamp) with wine and decided to uninstall wine but the problem is that I don’t know how to do it! Could you please help me with that? what I want is to uninstall it completely without leaving any sign! I mean to uninstall it from the system delete the folders it creates at the time of installation and delete from the applications menu !! everything. Greetings I hope to receive a good and easy help !!

Excellent! Winchester, Wintendo or whatever that «operating» system is called, is rubbish compared to the versatility of UNIX !! what stability if we talk about fedora, devian, etc . these are competent operating systems!

I’m from Venezueal and I installed CANAIMA on my computer to not use WINDOWS but I have a program that I don’t know how to do to make it run in WINE if you can give me a hand I would be in debt . the program can be seen in http://www.jovenes-cristianos.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=766:software-biblioteca-cristiana-adventista-2011&catid=37:tutoriales&Itemid=59 what you can do for me THANK YOU

The link is broken .

On August 10, 2011 21:10 PM, Disqus
<> wrote:

just an excellent article friend thank you very much

I’m glad it worked! Thanks x comment.
We hope to see you here more often.
Cheers! Paul.

Very good info, Using Wine and Play on Linux I’m trying to install Microsoft’s .net and I’m going crazy, version 4 won’t let me and it tries to install version 2 automatically, is this normal?

Hello, I have already read everything, I have also found out but . I do not get anything from .EXE . ; (And I want to download it. A friend of mine has the WINDOWS program (In copy) because she found a strange page on the internet. I would like you to help me in this because it is important to you. IF you can as soon as possible, better. A kiss 😉 Graxx for reading and helping (I HOPE) xD

See, install an epson fx-890 printer as a 9-pin printer…. I want to configure my printer to print half a page and not skip the entire page…. I have a pre-printed form that is half a page size 5.5 ″ x 11 ″ inches. thanks