Vulkan Support Is Being Worked On For Wine

Support for running Vulkan Windows programs and games under Wine is currently being developed.

There's been this bug report for the past month suggesting that Wine utilize Vulkan for its Direct3D/HLSL translations. However, that idea really is unlikely to work out as explained by Wine developer Gabríel Arthúr Pétursson. "Translating DirectX 9/10/11 or OpenGL to Vulkan commands is unlikely to bring any performance improvements over existing solutions. OpenGL and DirectX 9/10/11 drivers are already employing highly tuned heuristics and tricks to bring out the best possible performance given the limitations of these APIs."

However, Gabríel did mention in his bug comment this week that he is working on the wrapper support to allow Vulkan programs to run on Wine. "I'm currently working on implementing Vulkan support, to allow running Vulkan programs under Wine. Hopefully I should have patches available for you all to play with soon."

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The WineHQ Wine development release 1.9.6 is now available for Linux and Mac

The WineHQ Wine development release 1.9.6 is now available for Linux and Mac

What's new in this release:

• Better video card detection when using Mesa.
• Support for Shader Model 5 shaders.
• C++ exception handling improvements.
• Various bug fixes.

The source is available now. Binary packages are in the process of being built, and will appear soon at their respective download locations.

Bugs fixed in 1.9.6 (total 32):

  17540  Zondervan Pradis 6.0 hangs due to ole32.dll.CoGetCurrentLogicalThreadId stub
  21475  TI Interactive application fails when attempting to display the TI math palette
  22533  Half-Life: Logo video rendering is wrong (msrle32 does not handle frames with 0 biClrUsed)
  25086  Multiple games and applications need kernel32.GetLogicalProcessorInformationEx implementation (CPU-Z 1.72, Splinter Cell: Blacklist, Adobe CC 2015, Kontakt 5)
  28177  Adventure games from Kheops Studio hang after the logo screen (Safecracker, Destination: Treasure Island, Nostradamus: Lost Prophecy, Dracula 3, Return to Mysterious Island 2)
  29458  Explorer sometimes crashes on drag-and-drop in folders accessed from "/"
  32237  A slower speed of light: Summer 2012 version crashes after Intro
  32314  Pikachu Volleyball (English version) crashes on restart
  32827  Legrand XlPro 3 (MFC app) crashes on startup (failure to load registry-free COM servers via app hook, 'OleCreate' must ignore HRESULT of 'IOleObject::GetMiscStatus')
  33787  IE8 crashes on new tab
  34303  underlined 8 point Times New Roman text doesn't display as underlined
  35471  Telepone (MTSP FIM) needs msvcr100.dll._CreateFrameInfo
  37949  eLicenser Control Center needs msvcr80.dll.__CxxRegisterExceptionObject
  39239  ole32:compobj fails if privileges not high enough
  39278  Multiple DirectX 10 games crash on unimplemented function d3d10_1.dll.D3D10CreateDeviceAndSwapChain1 (Assassin's Creed)
  39461  Garmin Homeport 2.2.9 crashes on unimplemented function msvcr90.dll.__CxxRegisterExceptionObject
  39510  EZCastPro 1.4/1.5 crashes on unimplemented function USER32.dll.QueryDisplayConfig
  39577  Fallout 4 needs WINED3DFMT_R11G11B10_FLOAT render target
  39674  3Dmark03, 05, 06 not started "System Info Error"
  39797  The suffering does not start, needs wmasf.dll
  39878  Diablo II does not start on 64bit system with more than 2GB VRAM cards
  39918  Mail.Ru GameCenter installer does not work
  40115  ole32:compobj regression (privilege issue)
  40147  Assertion 'm->state == STATE_PASSIVE' failed at pulse/mainloop.c:827 on starting Skype 7.18.0.112
  40190  7z fails at enumerating network places
  40201  EccoPro only works on Wine 1.6.2
  40221  Adobe Illustrator CC 2015 needs user32.GetGestureConfig
  40222  IMalloc(Spy)::Free nullptr
  40246  Please document WINEBUILD in the winegcc manpage
  40253  Build regression: Can't remove fonts: is a directory (--with-wine64, shared wow64)
  40287  steamwebhelper crashes in Windows 7 mode
  40312  Please look for builtin *.fon fonts in fontdir

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Mariner Software is having a 50% off spring sale

Mariner Software has a huge 50% off spring sale going on this and next week this is your chance save 50% off their great word editing, blogging, journal and recipe software.

Clear Insight Products has a really nice page setup about this sale and and Mariner Software. You should take the time and check the site out.

Because I have been a fan of this software for so long Mariner sent me a promo code and have allowed me to pass it on to my Clear Insight Productions connections. 

This promotion is for a limited time though. At 11:59pm Central time on Sunday, March 27th 2016, the sale will come to an end. So visit the eStore and use PRN6 when you check out to receive your discount.​

“One of the best blog editors we’ve seen.”
MacWorld Magazine

"Really like this app a lot and always looking forward the next revision with its new features. I have been happily using MacJournal since the beginning. Sometimes I even get up to using it half of the days which is a lot for me."
Howard R. Lieberman
Chairman CEO
Silicon Valley Innovation Institute

"This is a thank you for a superb product. I am writing more than I have done for quite some time. It is journal writing and getting my thoughts down in words. I love that I can specify different types of journals and make sub journals. It is so easy and everything is in one place. This is so wonderful and everything is dated. I really appreciate the convenience and ease of using MacJournal. Later I may take a look at your stuff for writers. Thanks again."
Bicki Smith
MacJournal user

Mariner Software Paperless 2 review

Mariner Software’s Paperless 2 is a good replacement for typical software that comes bundled with most scanners. For just a little extra investment, you’ll get a wide range of additional features. You can create a database for every document imaginable with Paperless. From receipts and bills to your five-year-old’s drawings, Paperless stores and organizes them all.

Paperless is compatible with most scanners but Mariner Software highly recommends the use of Fujitsu ScanSnap S1100, ScanSnap S1300 or ScanSnap S1500 scanners. Mariner Software is an authorized partner of Fujitsu and Paperless is designed to work seamlessly with Fujitsu ScanSnap line.

Paperless stands out for numerous of reasons and it makes organizing papers as easy as it could get. The software has a good usability. The large graphical icons at the top of the toolbar give you an access to all of the most significant functions. The main window of the software has three columns. There is a file browser on the left, document image in the middle at the top, list of documents below it and the details about the currently selected document on the right.

You can store almost any type of document such as pdf, web archives, emails, word, excel, RTF, JPEG and TIFF. Conveniently, you can scan documents directly to Paperless or import existing files from the hard drive. The scanned documents can be placed in files which you have to set out in advanced. Setting up the files for scanned documents is a fairly easy and quick.

Paperless has OCR (Optical character recognition) function which recognizes the text on the document and adds it to the Details Window. Your own notes and tags can also be added to the document. Paperless does not support reconstruction of the document after OCR. This function is available in more expensive Nuance’s Paperport software.

After scanning you can crop and rotate the documents in the scan dialogue. However, this can’t be done after the documents have been imported. It is possible to change the order of the existing pages as well as split and merge documents.

All documents can be viewed by the scanning date or by the collection. Paperless also has a calendar view. Of any collection you can create expense chart, table, pie or contact report.
A digital document is accepted by the IRS according to ruling Rev. Proc. 97-22. Therefore all your legal documents can be archived with Paperless.

Pros:
+Affordable price
+Works seamlessly with Fujitsu ScanSnap line
+Has all the necessary features for a typical user

Cons:
-OCR does not reconstruct documents

You can use any of these 4 coupons in the Mariners online store and save between 5% and 25% off the retail price of new purchases or one of the 5 pack bundles.

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