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Thursday, October 29, 2015

Скидка 15% от Codeweavers CrossOver

Вы можете сэкономить 20% от CodeWeavers CrossOver Linux для Mac и с промо-код на кассе ( TOM23 ) в CodeWeavers интернет-магазине. С CrossOver вы можете запускать приложения Microsoft Windows и Linux игры на Mac или без необходимости в лицензии Windows.

А если вы используете этот скидочный код ( TOM23 ) вы можете сэкономить дополнительные 20% от $20.95 цене.
 
Run Microsoft Windows Applications and Games on Mac, Linux or ChromeOS save up to 20% off  CodeWeavers CrossOver+ today.
 

Wednesday, October 14, 2015

PlayOnLinux Review Playing Windows Games Was Never Easier

PlayOnLinux is a well-known app that allows its users to install and run games and applications that have been released only for the Windows platform, without breaking any laws.

There is no denying that Windows has a large number of applications and games at its disposal and that some of those are actually pretty good. In fact, up until just a couple of years ago, most of the games were only released for Windows systems and occasionally for Mac OS. That has changed somewhat, but not all that much. Quite a few titles are still Windows-only, and people are still looking for old software.

Some of you will say that we already have Wine and that Crossover is doing a great job, and you would be right to some extent. The problem is that Wine is only friendly if the game is working out of the box, which doesn't happen all that often. Also, Crossover is a commercial application, and not everyone will be inclined to buy it, although it's extremely good. Keep in mind that many of the Wine developers are actually working for Codeweavers, the developers of Crossover.

PlayOnLinux is using Wine, and that is not really a secret, but its makers have gone a step further. They have also implemented a GUI that helps users get a much better understanding of what's going on and that makes the entire installation process mostly automated. You still have access to some of the most complex stuff, but it's possible that you won't need to.

Installation

I tested PlayOnLinux in Ubuntu 15.10 (Wily Werewolf), which technically is not a stable release just yet. I didn't have any problems with the application itself, but Wine decided to put up some resistance. Fortunately, PlayOnLinux is actually smart enough to install and use newer versions of Wine, even if dependencies are broken on the distro.

There is no official PPA for Ubuntu, but the developers do provide a DEB file and it installs just fine. If you want to use a third-party PPA, the guys from Noobslab have one in place. In any case, here is how you install the application by using the DEB file. Download the file, open a terminal where the file is located, and enter the following commands (root will be required):

sudo dpkg -i PlayOnLinux_4.2.9.deb
sudo apt-get install -f
PlayOnLinux also needs Wine, so we'll have to install that as well. As I was saying earlier, I had problems installing Wine 1.7 in Ubuntu 15.10, so I had to settle with Wine 1.6. This is not a major problem since PlayOnLinux can download and use other versions of Wine. Open a terminal and enter these commands:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntu-wine/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install wine1.7
If you can get 1.7 to work, you can also install the 1.6 version.

Usage

PlayOnLinux is not a difficult-to-use application, and it has something for everyone. If you don't want to do anything complicated, then you just hit the Install button and look there for the application or game that you want. Those are basically profiles, which have been put together by people from the community.

Let's say that you want to play Bioshock. You select the game from the list, and PlayOnLinux will download some packages like Mono or Wine 1.4 (confirmed to work with Bioshock), and you get to a step where you are asked what kind of installation it is - from a file stored locally, from a DVD-ROM, or from Steam. I have that game on Steam, so I'll select that one. I will also have to download some proprietary fonts, but the application will take care of that as well.

I also have to install Steam, since I can't just use the Steam for Linux. The process will take a while because I have to download Bioshock, but as you can see, everything works smoothly. This was the scenario for something that was already available, but I also installed one of my favorite RTS games, the old Blitzkrieg, and that's not listed. The procedure is not much different, and I used my GOG.com copy. It went pretty much the same way, and I didn't have any issue.

It's also worth pointing out that you can also customize the application itself, quite a great deal, and you also access to the Wine installation as well. For example, I usually set Wine to work in a window and not in full screen. If something goes wrong (it happens sometimes), you can lock up your system with no way of shutting the application.

Another cool feature is the PlayOnLinux Vault that lets users save successful installations for later, with compression or without. This way, when you have a new installation of an OS, you just restore that package, and you don't have to do everything from scratch.

Run Microsoft Windows Applications and Games on Mac, Linux or ChromeOS save up to 20% off  CodeWeavers CrossOver+ today.

WineBottler 1.7.52 has been released now runs on OS X El Capitain

WineBottler 1.7.52 is a major update which sports some thrilling new features.

Runs on OS X El Capitan

Probably the most important feature is the update to run on OS X El Capitan. In Apples proven one-two-combination, after the visual fixes in OS X Yosemite, we could expect a major cleanup in OS X El Capitan. Apple did this with security on its mind, so the proverb “There is the Easy Way and Then There is the Right Way” smacked the lazy dev in the face, once again.

First, Apple got rid of LD_LIBRARY_PATH and DYLD_FALLBACK_LIBRARY_PATH. Forcing us to “otool -L” and “install_name_tool -change” thru all the bins and libs of Wine to use proper @rpath relative paths for all Wine related libraries. The result is, of course, a correct linking through out the app – thank you Apple. I guess somebody has to kick you once a while to come up with proper solutions.

Then Apple implemented App Transport Security which forces us to use secure connections for interactions between Apps and web services – or to disable it. For now it is disabled in WineBottler, but I’m working hard on offering SSL connections to get this right. After all it is all about security and privacy.

Further there where some GUI/multithreading glitches (Toolbar and FilePicker dialog) that lead to crashes on El Capitan and the new Codesigning requirements that have been sorted out.

Saves up to 92% harddrive-space

Yep, this one sounds to good to be true… right? :) But here we go:
A clean Wine prefix weights in about 35mb. But Wine requires big add ons like gecko (for Webservices, 50mb) and mono (for .net Apps, 200mb) by default. They might not be needed by your app, but blow up an empty prefix up to 300mb. These two add ons can now be excluded: down 84%.

Further we added an option, to remove the “c:\users” directory when shipping an app. Wine will automatically add new users, when the app is run on a clients Mac.

Then you can automatically remove installer files (.msi) from your prefix before shipping – if they are no longer needed.

Lastly, we have optimized how WineBottler runs your prefixes. To this point, WineBottler will copy a prefix from the App to the folder ~/Application Support. This approach allows us to install Apps to restricted System folders, or Codesign them, without breaking the signature or having to give read and write access to the app, since the App works in the users Applications Support folder. We stick to that design, but we no longer copy, but link the files to ~/Application Support. Changes files will break the link and replace it with the new file. Unchanged files will only take up some bites, instead of a complete copy, saving nearly 50% of disk-space. THIS FEATURE IS STILL VERY NEW AND IN TESTING! So I’m more than happy to hear from you.

New Wine and mono version

Finally we included the current latest and greatest Wine: Wine changelog.

Thank you very much!

For your ongoing interest and support for this project. All dough I can’t answer all the mails, I’m always interested in feedback and suggestions. Thank you very much.

 WineBottler 1.7.52

As usual: head over to winebottler.kronenberg.org and grab your copy :) .

enjoy
Mike

CodeWeavers just launched their new website that is mobile friendly in advance of their pending CrossOver Android release

CodeWeavers just launched their new website that is mobile friendly in advance of their pending CrossOver Android release. The new site has been refreshed and has a new FrontPage that gives users easy options to navigate the site.



 
The new CodeWeavers mobile site is a little more exciting, web pages now render correctly for a mobile device and also render much faster now. Their is a new mobile friendly store where you can not only purchase the forthcoming CrossOver Android release but it makes it easy to purchase from your phone for your laptop or PC. Customers will now be able to purchase CrossOver Linux easily from their Android phone and then at a later time download and install their new software. This also applies for iOS users having the option to purchase CrossOver Mac from their iPad or iPhone and installing the software at a later time of their convenience.


 
Waiting to see :  RUN WINDOWS SOFTWARE EASILY ON ANDROID WITH CROSSOVER  :)

 
The only thing to do now is wait a little while longer until CrossOver Android is released then I can have hours of enjoyment testing applications and games on my Tablet and phones.

Run Microsoft Windows Applications and Games on Mac, Linux or ChromeOS save up to 20% off  CodeWeavers CrossOver+ today.