Cats and Dogs living together MASS HYSTERIA Windows apps come to Android

Announced back in July, the Crossover for Android Preview by Codeweavers is finally here. The Codeweavers blog posts in the run-up alternated between pride and caution in regard to user expectations, but now that I’ve tried the alpha release they really should have dialed up the pride more. Even in this early of a state, it’s more than functional and an exciting look at the potential for future (gasp, even beta!) releases.

Just as a quick recap, the Crossover for Android Preview caveats:

• Your Chromebook needs access to the Play Store, which is currently only available for three devices. The Asus Flip, the Acer R11, and the Pixel 2015.
• Of those three devices only two have the Intel processors that Crossover requires, the R11 and the Pixel. Sorry Asus Flip owners! But there are likely many Intel based Chromebooks on the horizon.
• If you have an R11 or Pixel (2015), you need to be tuned to the Beta channel (previously Play Store access was only in the developer channel, but it’s improved leaps and bounds and now the Beta channel has it.)
• You need to sign-up to be a tester on the Codeweavers website.
• Give “Ramey’s Rules for the Technology Preview” a read. They essentially boil down to: have fun, but don’t be a jerk.

Once (or if, depending on when you signed up) you receive an email from Codeweavers saying that you have access to the Preview, you’ll be able to follow the link they provide to get access to the Crossover app in the Play Store.

Initially I had to install it to my Pixel via the browser, but once it’s installed, you can uninstall/reinstall from the Play Store on your device.

Codeweavers has a guide on installing the Preview here:

https://www.codeweavers.com/support/wiki/android/androidtutorial

But there’s a few items you can skip (or at least that I did, with no apparent side-effects). The big one being that you don’t need to switch your Chromebook to Developer Mode. Which is nice, since it’s easier than you’d think to accidentally wipe your Chromebook every time you boot, and the big scary boot screen will greet you with an absolutely terrifying beeping if you don’t CTRL+D to skip the boot sequence.

Second, I’d recommend sticking with the Beta channel. I was running the Developer channel just to test out Android apps on ChromeOs, and it’s exactly what you would (or should) expect from a Dev channel. It’s unstable. My apps crashed more, my fans/Chromebook had a tendency to race and heat up, and generally not the best day-to-day experience if you rely on your Chromebook for any amount of real-life work.

Codeweavers gives a ballpark figure of about an hour from Powerwash to first install, but I imagine that will vary widely. The Pixel is pretty zippy, and when I timed it from start (Powerwashing) to finish (actually logged into Steam via the Crossover app) the whole process clocked in at just under 7 minutes.

When you launch, you’ll notice the very first thing it suggests you install is Steam. There are some built-in tools such as a file browser, command line, and access to the Wine configuration settings, but the only guaranteed working programs at the moment are Steam, Microsoft Office 2007/2010, and WinZip 14. If you’re feeling adventurous, you can uncheck the “Only known-good applications” box and see what else is on the list. The DirectX for pre-XP games and for Modern games could come in handy, depending what you’re installing.

I was able to install LibreOffice 5 with no issues via the file explorer, but every other install file I tried from other sources failed/errored (such as GoG games). The fewer extras what you’re trying to install requires (like .Net), the more luck you’ll have installing it outside the official “Install Application” menu list. The Pixel has an unusually high resolution for a Chromebook, so at the moment this makes the Crossover app text very, very, (very) tiny. You may also run into odd resizing issues. Steam will only cover the top half of the screen, for example. Even while maximized. For other windowed apps such as LibreOffice, you should be able to drag the program window to fully cover the workspace if you experiment with maximizing/minimizing the Crossover app itself, and then the programs running inside of it.

But really, if you’re anything like me, you’ll be spending most of your time in Steam.

My personal Steam library isn’t extensive, so I wasn’t able to try out many full games. But I did download every demo I could find that seemed even mildly interesting. Altogether I tried out 50 different games. Out of those 50, I was able to successfully start 13. Of those 13, 10 were in what I’d consider genuinely playable condition. That’s without messing with Wine configuration settings or Library overrides, which from my point of view are indistinguishable from blasphemous magicks.

As a final attempt to temper folks’ expectations, I don’t recommend installing this Alpha with the expectation it’s going to replace your Windows desktop or Crossover for Linux/Mac. Apps will crash. Some games will be working perfectly one day, and refuse to launch the next. Installed programs will break Wine (I think certain games force updates to DirectX or other Windows files that make games with different needs a bit angry and sullen), forcing you to clear the app’s data entirely and start over. In some cases, certain settings and changes persist even if you uninstall and reinstall the app, and you’ll need to Powerwash your Chromebook to start from scratch (it’s a Chromebook, so your stuff is in the cloud anyway, right?)

While I found performance and load times to be completely reasonable, the Pixel has a Core i7 processor, 16GB of RAM, and Intel HD 5500 integrated graphics. Once the new wave of Chromebooks come out with full (non-beta) Play Store support come out, I’m sure they’ll come close to that amount of horsepower, but for now it’s a minority in a minority in a minority. If you have an R11, be prepared to wait when apps are first launching.

People this preview is for:

• Curious early adopters.
• Patient hobbyists.
• Egalitarian product testers.
• Pickers, grinners, lovers, and sinners.

Who this preview is not for:

• People who need a specific Windows program to run perfectly for their work or business.
• Folks who don’t read instructions and will ultimately try to install the Preview on ARM devices or games that aren’t even supported by Wine. No new DOOM here, move along.
• Veruca Salt inspired individuals who expect something free to provide them effortless instant gratification.
• Jokers, smokers, and midnight tokers (who get their lovin’ on the run). Your skills are needed elsewhere.

Without further ado, the list of games I tried:

Aliens vs Predator Demo	Intro video plays, then crashes.
Batman: Arkham Asylum - Demo	Doesn't launch.
BioShock	Startup logo appears, then crashes. Possibly related to Wine bug more than anything else: https://appdb.winehq.org/objectManager.php?sClass=version&iId=17740
Braid Demo	Works!
Broken Sword 1 - Shadow of the Templars: Director's Cut	Doesn't launch.
Europa Universalis IV	Startup menu loads, but crashes when you try to start a game.
F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin Demo	Doesn't launch.
Fallout: New Vegas	Startup menu loads, but crashes when you try to start a game.
Gratuitous Space Battles - Demo	Doesn't launch.
Gratuitous Tank Battles Demo	Doesn't launch.
Half-Life 2: Demo	WORKS! (Once you tweak one of the video settings)
Hard Reset - Demo	Doesn't launch.
Heroes of Might & Magic III - HD Edition	Startup menu loads, but crashes when you try to start a game.
Homeworld Remastered Collection	Doesn't launch.
Ikaruga Demo	Works! (If you're willing to do some DLL shifting in the File Explorer.)
Left 4 Dead 2	Works, but no audio.
Life Is Strange™	Doesn't launch.
LIMBO Demo	Works!
Magic 2014 Demo	Doesn't launch.
Magic 2015 Demo	Doesn't launch.
Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes	Doesn't launch.
Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee Demo	You can hear the intro (no video), but otherwise doesn't start properly.
Orcs Must Die! 2 Demo	Startup menu loads, but crashes/hangs on the loading screen when you try to start a game.
Orcs Must Die! Demo	Doesn't launch.
Overlord Demo	Technically works, but graphical glitches make it unplayable.
Overlord II - Demo	Technically works, but graphical glitches make it unplayable.
Painkiller Overdose Demo	Doesn't launch.
Planetary Annihilation: TITANS	Doesn't launch (requires OpenGL)
Portal: First Slice	WORKS! (Once you tweak one of the video settings)
RONIN Demo	Startup menu loads, but crashes/hangs on the loading screen when you try to start a game.
Serious Sam HD: The First Encounter Demo	Doesn't launch.
Shank 2 Demo	Doesn't launch.
Shank Demo	Doesn't launch.
Sid Meier's Civilization III: Complete	Doesn't launch.
Sid Meier's Civilization IV	Doesn't launch.
Sid Meier's Civilization V	Startup menu loads, but crashes/hangs on the loading screen when you try to start a game.
Sid Meier's Civilization: Beyond Earth Demo	Doesn't launch.
Sid Meier's Pirates!	Doesn't launch.
Space Pirates and Zombies Demo	Doesn't launch.
Supreme Commander 2 - Demo	Doesn't launch.
The Longest Journey Demo	Doesn't launch.
Thief 2	Doesn't launch.
Thief Gold	Doesn't launch, but you can hear the intro.
Thief: Deadly Shadows	Doesn't launch.
This War of Mine	Doesn't launch.
Torchlight Demo	Works!
Torchlight II Demo	Works!
Trine 2 Demo	Technically works, but the button to start the game can't be clicked.
Trine Demo	Works!
World of Goo Demo	Works!

Now, 10 out of 50 may not sound good. But this is the very first public alpha release, and keep in mind THAT A MONTH AGO THIS WASN’T EVEN POSSIBLE.

Plus, when one of the games that works is Half-life 2, that deserves bonus points. Let’s call it a 50/50 split.

Braid installed with no muss and no fuss. Framerate was good and the controls were responsive. There was one fluke where I somehow disabled the audio, and couldn’t get it to come back until after a Powerwash and fresh install of Crossover. I did find the overall framework/story to be a bit depressing. Don’t play this after a breakup or fight with your partner. The idea of grown individuals referring to their partners as a princesses non-ironically seems weird to me, even in a world with dino salesmen and some sort of springy bush people that seem like they’re trying to mind their own business until you jump on them.

Half-life 2 was hands-down the most exciting game I was able to get up and running. Initially the game would start, but with no video. You could hear Gordon moving around and responding to keyboard commands. It turns out there’s a setting in the advanced video options called “Multicore Rendering”. For Source Engine games like HL2, Portal, or L4D2, you’re going to want to disable that. Everything else can be set to whatever you like, depending on your tolerance for framerate drops and jitters. I will say that Valve did not design these games with touchpad and touchscreen users in mind, so I spent an embarrassing amount of time staring at the floor and/or ceiling until I got the hang of things enough to actually look around. Which severely hampered my progress at figuring out a way to kill Barney, because, well, he’s a dope. Apparently even alien gods have a special provenance for interdimensional fools and children.

I have a soft spot for Treasure’s excellent shoot-em-ups, even if my reflexes aren’t up to snuff when it comes to actually playing their bullet hell games. There’s an issue getting Ikaruga going (also described in the description here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HJGxbJoKUQU ) involving the DirectX update it requires failing because it can’t overwrite certain DLLs in the System32 folder. Delete them, install DirectX from the Ikaruga Steamapps folder, then restore them from the trash (overwriting the new DLLs in the process). If you’re not super stoked at the thought of dodging hundreds of lethal colored blobs while returning fire with your own colored blobs, you may want to give this one a miss, just because of the extra effort required. If you go to the trouble, however, it plays perfectly.

Left 4 Dead 2 is technically playable, albeit with no sound and some graphical glitches. I even successfully joined an online game by accident, so the multiplayer works! But again, not really designed for touchpad/touchscreen control. I spent my time staring at the floor/rooftop, contemplating what horrible transgressions Ellis committed in a past video game life to be stranded in a world of zombies with no control over his Y-axis.

I believe Limbo is one of the games mentioned in the Codeweaver blog posts, which is what gave me the idea to focus on 2009-2011 era DirectX 8/9 games to begin with. The game runs perfectly, but it does feel a bit sluggish (in the video and controls). I’m not sure how much of that is being run through Wine, and how much is by design since you’re essentially some sort of dead ghost boy in a foggy ghost world with unclear motivations and probably not a lot of time-sensitive appointments.

This is my first experience with Portal, and I can see what all the fuss was about. It runs just as well as Half-Life 2, once you disable the same “Multicore Rendering” setting. Once I started dropping myself through infinite loops it occurred to me that this is a great game to be testing on a program whose name is a recursive acronym. It’s hobby inception.

Torchlight and Torchlight II both run fantastically. Even if you crank up the settings, the framerate is still playable. Also, because the game is mouse focused, you can place 90% of it by tapping on your touchscreen. It’s practically a tablet game experience at that point, and a lot of fun. They do suffer from what I can only describe as executable file ennui. Sometimes when you click play, it will appear to start, and nothing will happen. Clicking on “Play” and holding it down for about five seconds seems to help, but that could also be completely psychosomatic as I repeatedly click on the play button until the game concedes and finally launches. It’s not unlike being a five-year-old poking your sleeping parent in the side until they finally relent and get up so you can open your Christmas presents BECAUSE REALLY CHRISTMAS TECHNICALLY STARTED FOUR HOURS AGO HOW CAN YOU STILL BE SLEEPING? Half-Life 2, Portal, and the two Torchlight games are the gems of my Crossover for Android experience thus far.

Trine runs well, the graphics are good, and the controls responsive. I am, however, potentially the world’s worst grappling-hook based video game player in the world, if there are championships for that type of thing (I’m available!) and an impartial way of quantifying just how terrible one needs to be to get stuck between too inconveniently placed sliding wood medieval doors. Trine 2 seems like it would also run just as well, but there doesn’t seem to be any key, key combination, or mouse click capable of starting the demo. Maybe folks with gamepads will have better luck.

On the one hand, World of Goo runs perfectly. On the other, it seems to be a bizarrely story-driven game about sentient globs of goo. With eyeballs and childlike gurgles of glee. This is what happens when you don’t just let your children have that puppy they wanted because they promise to love it and walk it and take care of it at least until the next iPhone comes out and then you end up doing all the work but at least they’re not obsessed about semi-solid socialist blobs.

For people interested in seeing how the games perform in action, I’ve uploaded several clips to YouTube. Theoretically running Screencastify may have given me a framerate hit, but the performance you see in the videos is very close to what I experienced actually playing the games. That includes any stutters and freezes, and the audio is a bit crackly for all programs running through the Android app.

CrossOver For Android Torchlight II

CrossOver for Android Torchlight

CrossOver for Android Half life 2 Black Screen 

CrossOver for Android Half life 2 test 2

 CrossOver for Android Portal

 More Videos

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Cheers!

World of Warcraft on Linux with Wine with Screenshots and Video

Installing World of Warcraft (WoW) in Ubuntu or Linux Mint (with Wine) is pretty easy, however there are various crashes that can occur, especially if you're not using the latest Wine and also, the FPS can be pretty low without a few tweaks, so I though I'd document everything I did to get World of Warcraft to work properly on my laptop (Nvidia Optimus, so I was able to test the game with both Nvidia and Intel graphics), even in large scale PvPs and hopefully, this will help you play WoW under Ubuntu or Linux Mint.

Install World of Warcraft in Ubuntu / Linux Mint

1. Download the WoW installer (you can of course use a CD/DVD instead).

2. Optional but recommended Install the latest Wine development release:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:wine/wine-builds
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install --install-recommends wine-devel winehq-devel

For better FPS with the dxd9 gxapi, you can use Wine Staging with the CMST option enabled (but note that wine-staging tends to get buggy from time to time).

3. Right click the downloaded installer, right click it and select Open With > Wine Windows Program Loader (update: with newer Wine versions, double clicking the installer should work too):

Then install Battle.net:

Update: a recent Battle.net update broke the UI for Linux users with Intel graphics. You can find a workaround here: Partial Workaround For Black / Distorted Battle.net UI On Linux (Wine) With Intel Graphics

4. And finally, launch Battle.net from the menu / Dash (the icon should also be on your desktop unless you've deselected that option) and install World of Warcraft:

Fixing various potential World of Warcraft crashes (Ubuntu / Linux Mint w/ Wine)
A. If the World of Warcraft installer / Battle.net crashes

If Battle.net crashes on start:

Fix it by launching winecfg (type "winecfg" in a terminal) and on the Libraries tab, under "New override for library", enter "dbghelp" (without the quotes), then click "Add". Next, select "dbghelp" under "Existing overrides" and click "Edit" and in the new pop-up, set it to "Disable":

Update August 2016: after some Battle.net update, the app crashes due to some issues with msvcp140. To fix this issue, open winecfg (type "winecfg" in a terminal), and on the Libraries tab, enter "msvcp140", then click "Add".

Next, select "msvcp140", click "Edit", and set it to "Native then Builtin".

Update 2 August 2016: if Battle.net still crashes, change the "dbghelp" library override settings (see above) to "Native, then Builtin".

B. If you're on 64bit and the World of Warcraft 64bit game client crashes with an error similar to this:

ERROR #132 (0x85100084) Fatal exception!

Program: C:\Program Files\World of Warcraft\Wow-64.exe
ProcessID: 57
Exception: 0xC0000005 (ACCESS_VIOLATION) at 0033:0000000005A11A71

The instruction at "0x0000000005A11A71" referenced memory at 

"0x00007F38ACD6C028". The memory could not be "read".

... you'll need to force World of Warcraft to use the 32bit client. If you use Battle.net to launch the game (that's only possible if you don't use OpenGL, see below), you can change WoW to use the 32bit client from the Battle.net settings available via left-click on the blue icon on the top-left Battle.net corner - the menu is not responsive and unfortunately you have to click quite a few times to get it to work.

Or, you can launch World of Warcraft using a script - adding "-noautolaunch64bit" will force the 32bit WoW client to be launched instead of the 64bit one. If you're already using a script, simply add "-noautolaunch64bit" at the end of your WoW launch command. Or, if you're not using a script already, create a new text file in your home folder - let's call it "wow" and in this file, paste the following:

on Ubuntu / Linux Mint 32bit:

#!/bin/sh

WINEDEBUG=-all wine "/home/YOURUSERNAME/.wine/drive_c/Program Files/

World of Warcraft/WoW.exe" -noautolaunch64bit

(replace "YOURUSERNAME" with your username; you may need to adjust your WoW.exe path!)

on Ubuntu / Linux Mint 64bit:

#!/bin/sh

WINEDEBUG=-all wine "/home/YOURUSERNAME/.wine/drive_c/Program Files 

(x86)/World of Warcraft/WoW.exe" -noautolaunch64bit

(replace "YOURUSERNAME" with your username; you may need to adjust your WoW.exe path!)

Then save the file and make it executable using the following command (assuming you've created the "wow" file in your home directory):

chmod +x ~/wow

Then double click the "wow" file and run it to launch WoW (you can also launch it from the command line using "~/wow", or edit the World of Warcraft desktop file to point to your newly created script).

C. 64bit only: if you're using Bumblebee and World of Warcraft crashes with the following error:

X Error of failed request:  GLXUnsupportedPrivateRequest

Fix it by installing the 32bit virtualgl-libs:

sudo apt-get install virtualgl-libs:i386

D. If World of Warcraft fails at the login screen (it's unable to connect) when launching the game through Battle.net and you're using the OpenGL gxapi, you'll find a work-around below, under the WoW Linux/Wine optimizations and tweaks - see "A. Use OpenGL".

Optimizations and tweaks (increase the World of Warcraft FPS under Linux, etc.)

A. Use OpenGL With the latest World of Warcraft 7.0.3 patch, using OpenGL is no longer usable due to the various visual glitches it causes, so I no longer recommend it. However, I'll leave the instructions here in case you want to try it.

There are numerous reports saying that World of Warcraft runs better using OpenGL. In my test, I did indeed get a much higher FPS when using Nvidia graphics, but not using Intel graphics. However, this depends on hardware so it may not be the case for you.

Unfortunately, running World of Warcraft with OpenGL from Battle.net is not possible at the time I'm writing this article, at least it wasn't in my test (and there are others who are experiencing the same issue) because World of Warcraft fails to connect. There is a work-around though.

To get World of Warcraft to connect when using OpenGL, you need to launch it using a script. To do this, create a new text file in your home folder - let's call it "wow" and in this file, paste the following:

On Ubuntu / Linux Mint 32bit:

#!/bin/sh

WINEDEBUG=-all wine "/home/YOURUSERNAME/.wine/drive_c/Program Files/

World of Warcraft/WoW.exe" -opengl

(replace "YOURUSERNAME" with your username; you may need to adjust your WoW.exe path!)

On Ubuntu / Linux Mint 64bit:

#!/bin/sh

WINEDEBUG=-all wine "/home/YOURUSERNAME/.wine/drive_c/Program Files 

(x86)/World of Warcraft/WoW.exe" -opengl

(replace "YOURUSERNAME" with your username; you may need to adjust your WoW.exe path!)

For Nvidia-users only: for threaded OpenGL performance optimization, add "__GL_THREADED_OPTIMIZATIONS=1" to the script you've just created, before "wine". After modifying the script, it should look like this:

- On Ubuntu / Linux Mint 32bit:

#!/bin/sh

WINEDEBUG=-all __GL_THREADED_OPTIMIZATIONS=1 wine "/home/YOURUSERNAME/

.wine/drive_c/Program Files/World of Warcraft/WoW.exe" -opengl

(replace "YOURUSERNAME" with your username; you may need to adjust your WoW.exe path!)

- On Ubuntu / Linux Mint 64bit:

#!/bin/sh

WINEDEBUG=-all __GL_THREADED_OPTIMIZATIONS=1 wine "/home/YOURUSERNAME/

.wine/drive_c/Program Files (x86)/World of Warcraft/WoW.exe" -opengl

(replace "YOURUSERNAME" with your username; you may need to adjust your WoW.exe path!)

Note: I've used "WINEDEBUG=-all" to turn off debugging output to improve performance a little bit further.

Next, make the script executable (the following command assumes you've called the script "wow" and created it in your home folder):

chmod +x ~/wow

Then double click the "wow" file and run it to launch WoW (you can also launch it from the command line using "~/wow", or edit the World of Warcraft desktop file to point to your newly created script).

That's not all. To boost the WoW FPS, also perform the following tweak: press ALT + F2, enter "regedit" (without the quotes) and:

• navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER -> Software -> Wine, select the Wine folder and right click it, then select New -> Key and rename the newly created key to "OpenGL" (without the quotes);
• select the "OpenGL" key, right click it and select New -> String Value;
• rename "New Value #1" to "DisabledExtensions" (without the quotes);
• double click on the newly created "DisabledExtensions" and enter "GL_ARB_vertex_buffer_object" (without the quotes) into the "value" field.

B. Intel graphics only

If you see black textures in the game or the game crashes, enable S3TC texture compression by following the steps below:

Firstly, install driconf:

sudo apt-get install driconf

Then launch driconf: it should show up as "3D Acceleration" in the menu/Dash (you can also launch it by pressing ALT + F2 and entering: "driconf") and on the Image Quality tab, set "Enable S3TC texture compression even if software support is not available" to "Yes", then close the window.

C. If you're still getting low FPS, here are a few game configuration tweaks (Config.wtf)

To be able to use the tweaks below, you need to run World of Warcraft at least once, or else the configuration file doesn't exist.

Open the Config.wtf file with a text editor (the file should be located under ~/

.wine/drive_c/Program Files (x86)/World of Warcraft/WTF/) and paste this:

SET M2UseShaders "0"
SET UseVertexShaders "0"
SET useWeatherShaders "0"
SET ffxGlow "0"
SET ffxDeath "0"
SET ffxSpecial "0"
SET weatherDensity "0"
SET reflectionMode "0"
SET maxFPS "60"
SET ffx "0"
SET maxFPSbk "5"
SET mapShadows "0"

Then save the file.

Other tweaks:

• Using some WoW addons can considerably lower your FPS so if the FPS is bad, you can try removing them (note that you'll have to remove the addons and not just disable them!) and see if that improves your FPS;
• For better performance, you can try the latest Wine Staging.
• For Ubuntu 14.04 and 14.10 / Linux Mint 17 and 17.1, you can use the Oibaf PPA (it requires Linux kernel >= 3.17 and wine from THIS PPA) which includes updated graphics drivers as well as Gallium Nine support which should get you a FPS boost in World of Warcraft with Direct3D.
• Update your graphics drivers - for Nvidia, you can use a PPA.

Update: for a couple of Curse-compatible applications that work on Linux, which you can use to install or update WoW addons via curse.com, see THIS article.

Are you playing World of Warcraft under Linux? What other optimizations / tweaks have you used?

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How to install Google SketchUp Make 2016 on Linux with Wine

How to install Google SketchUp Make 2016 on Linux with Wine...

Update on SketchUp Make 2016 Maintenance release

• This maintenance release fixes a Windows-only bug introduced in the first release of SketchUp 2016, also known as “M0” [version numbers 16.0.19912 (Win 64-bit); 16.0.19911 (Win 32-bit)] where uninstalling SketchUp resets your default Internet browser. To avoid running into this issue, leave SketchUp 2016 “M0” installed prior to installing this update – i.e., install SketchUp 2016 M1 over your existing version of SketchUp 2016 M0.
• This maintenance release is for both Windows and OS X and addresses a number of issues.
• See complete list of updates

How to install Google SketchUp Make 2016 on Ubuntu 16.04 using Wine

Step 1: Install Wine 1.9.x

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:wine/wine-builds

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install --install-recommends wine-staging

sudo apt-get install winehq-staging

Configure Wine for SketchUp by installing additional packages if prompted  

run winecfg

First change the Windows Version to Windows 7

Under Wine Configuration menu, click on Libraries and add ‘riched20’ as a new library. Apply changes

Download Windows version of SketchUp Make 2016
Right-click on the exe and click ‘Open with Wine Windows Program Loader

Follow the installation wizard to complete the installation

 Open Sketch 2016 properties menu, under command, add ‘/DisableRubyAPI’ at the end

Download the “mfc100u.dll” library frome here, and copy it in system32 wine folder. You can enable hidden folders under Nautilus with following key combination “ctrl+H”. In home folder, navigate to .wine/drive_c/windows/system32/ and copy it there.

Launch SketchUp Make 2016

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WineTricks has seen a massive amount of improvements this year

WineTricks has seen allot of development recently, some of the notable changes are better IE 8 support, MetaTrader 4 support, Kindle improvements, Russian translation, A new self update function and a massive amount of other fixes and updates. The full changelog sense February 2016 and August 2016 is provided below with a download link to get the latest release.

Winetricks is an easy way to work around problems in Wine. It has a menu of supported games/apps for which it can do all the workarounds automatically. It also lets you install missing DLLs or tweak various Wine settings individually.

It can be used via gui or commandline, whichever you prefer; the commandline mode is particularly useful as a building block in fancier wine frontends and in automated regression testing.

The latest version can be downloaded here

Changelog between 20160724 and 20160802

add win2k8/win8/win81/win10 verbs

Changelog between 20160219 and 20160724

github-api-releases.py: fix for Debian's python-magic
relase.sh: fix path to pgp signature file
test cleanups
opensymbol: update to latest
add win2k8/win8/win81/win10 verbs
winetricks: add initial embedded wine cmd support
tests: add some TODOs
tests/winetricks-test: avoid backtricks (``), use $()
winetricks: get rid of backticks(``), use $() instead
README.md: fix typo
tests/winetricks-test: add some basic .verb tests
README: add some .verb documentation
winetricks_handle_options: alphabetize case list
src/release.sh: fix path to github-api-releases.py
src/release.sh: specify the GPG key to use
src/release.sh: create local signed release tarball
github-api-releases.py: check in script, authored by Joseph Bisch
wmv9vcm: new verb
w_get_sha1sum(): only try to verify sha1sum for actual files
winetricks: miscellaneous spelling updates
winetricks: Add separate override just for d3dx10_43
kindle: update to version 1.16 (build 44025)
kindle: Fix bug reference number
winetricks.1: Change strings to proper case, wine to Wine, etc
w_try_ar(): use 7zip as a fallback if ar is missing
7zip: update to latest release
opensymbol: restore J flag to tar
w_try_ar: should be w_die, not w_fatal

winetricks: add a w_try_ar() function, give better warning if ar is missing
Override more vcrun2015 dlls for 32 bits prefix Fixes #650, tested with Python3.5.exe, on both 32/64 bits, wine 1.9.8/1.9.11.

w_wine_version: support wine-1.9.x
Update ev3 verb
adobeair: remove extra space in metadata
mt4: do not use checksum for mt4setup.exe which may change
winetricks: update Ukrainian translation
release.sh: allow overridding version
Update control
foobar2000: update to v1.3.10
update src/release.sh for github releases, also now updates manpage
update manpage
Makefile: update copyright
Makefile: winetricks now uses git, not svn

winetricks: remove python26_comtypes / python26_setuptools broken, old, and not actively supported upstream

winetricks: print winetricks and wine version in winetricks_init()
add .gitignore
jet40: restore original microsoft.com url
cmd: revert back to a microsoft.com URL (really, archive.org)
xna40: add Louis' workaround from bug 30718

Self-update functionality for winetricks.

- With this patch it is possible to use "winetricks --self-update|--selfupdate" to automatically update the script with the last online version. Also, it is possible to rollback an update by running "winetricks --update-rollback";
- Added checking to avoid running the command into dev versions of winetricks;
- Added message for users who run unprivileged and do not have the proper permissions to update winetricks.

w_download_to(): fix aria2c torify support
winetricks: add -t/--torify support
mt4: new verb (Meta Trader 4)
windowscodecs: initial 64-bit esupport
vcrun2015: also extract api-ms-win-crt-conio-l1-1-0.dll
vcrun2015: warn about win7 mode installations failing
winetricks: improve aria2 support (fixes 612)
winetricks-test: xna40 now completes without an error dialog
Makefile: default to a 32-bit prefix if WINEARCH is not set
emu8086: update download URL
ev3: add -q support
winetricks: introduce W_UNATTENDED_SLASH_QB to unify /qb handling
ev3: update download URL
xna40: needs dotnet45, not dotnet40
vcrun2003: fix url
winetricks: check each test scripts dependencies before running any tests
linkcheck.sh: cleanup temp files after running
baekmuk: update URL and some cleanups
opensymbol: update URL to jessie (stable)
openwatcom: update URL
kindle: needs taskset -c 0, not vcrun2008
shockwave: update sha1sum
ie8_kb2936068: exit code 194 is not an error
Preliminary Russian translation By Artem S. Tashkinov
A real albeit untidy help page the old redirect is hard to swallow
ie6: make ie6 an automated download again
w_download_manual_to(): verify sha1sum of manually downloaded files
ie6: use $W_PACKAGE instead of hardcoding
ie8-kb2936068: rename to ie8_kb2936068, avoid warning on OSX.
ev3/ie8-kb2936068: minor cleanups
ev3: new verb
ie8-kb2936068: new verb
cmd: update download URL
kindle: update to version 1.14.43019

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