Which laptops work well with Flex?

[Nathan Straub 曹內森]

Dear all,

I am currently running Windows 10 on an Asus PC laptop from 2013, which I had upgraded last year with an SSD drive, but which is still too slow because the Ram is fixed at 4GB and cannot be upgraded. 

I am considering whether to get a Mac or PC for my next laptop. Does anyone have experience with reliability in running Flex on a Mac with Parallels? Or do you have any recommendations on laptops which seem to have good reliability and battery life for fieldwork? 

Thanks,

Nathan

[Kari Valkama]

Hi Nathan, 

I have used Macs since 90’s. 

Flex is a program that crashes every now and then. I have no idea if the Windows version would crash less. Some in our team use Linux, but they use only Paratext, not Flex. 

For virtualization we have used Parallels, which cost money, but VMware Fusion is free for non-profits. 

With Apple’s new processors (M1), they have an advantage over Intel in battery life and speed. However, Parallels nor VMWare Fusion do not yet have versions that work with Apple silicon (M1). They will be ready later this year. 

I am planning to wait until Parallels or VMWare Fusion work with Apple silicon (M1) before I buy a new Mac.

Yours, 

Kari

--
"FLEx list" messages are public. Only members can post.
flex_d...@sil.org
http://groups.google.com/group/flex-list.
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "FLEx list" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to flex-list+...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/flex-list/CADRusMwYYE7PfuyXAtz_gw4iPFqeori4GKBU2yPHiR7kiNaixA%40mail.gmail.com.

[David-Sari Gardner]

On Tue, 6 Apr 2021 at 19:04, 'Kari Valkama' via FLEx list <flex...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

Hi Nathan, 

I have used Macs since 90’s. 

Flex is a program that crashes every now and then. I have no idea if the Windows version would crash less. Some in our team use Linux, but they use only Paratext, not Flex. 

Flex is quite resource hungry for a big project. On linux it works, mostly, but it's very very slow, but there are also some strange glitches with some bits that e.g. totally fail to display. Running on a virtual machine makes it much more usable.

[Beth-docs Bryson]

Another common virtualization software is VirtualBox, from Oracle.  It is also free.  I don’t have firsthand knowledge to compare it to VMware or Parallels.  I tend to use VirtualBox, but at the moment I have a PC laptop for running FLEx, and I mainly use VirtualBox for installing Wasta to test out how things run in Linux.

In all three cases, if you want to run Windows in them, you would have to buy a license for Windows.  In all three you would have a choice of running Windows or Linux.  Other people’s comments on how well FLEx runs in Linux (native or virtual) are useful.

-Beth

--
"FLEx list" messages are public. Only members can post.
flex_d...@sil.org
http://groups.google.com/group/flex-list.
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "FLEx list" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to flex-list+...@googlegroups.com.

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/flex-list/CA%2BhA_QdHOWvAyD_GsMq8oEj8FeBO99U%2BtLBnF7MCb-K5jkqhVg%40mail.gmail.com.

[Paul Unger]

On Tuesday, April 6, 2021 at 11:37:35 AM UTC-7 Beth-docs Bryson wrote:

<snip> Other people’s comments on how well FLEx runs in Linux (native or virtual) are useful.

-Beth

Since you asked. ;-) I've been running FLEx 9.0.15 in Wasta Linux 20.04 for a little while. It's proving fairly stable, but it does bog down considerably whenever it gets to 'Sorting' (the little blue progress bar at the bottom). [Running "Filter for..." on any column in Lexicon Edit is a good time to take a little break... :-P Returning to "Show All" happens in a blink, though!] When FLEx gets too slow, I use System Monitor to "End Process" and restart it. When I was on Wasta 18.04, I actually needed to have FLEx running on a Virtual Box VM to be useful at all, but I haven't felt the need on Wasta 20. No idea what accounts for the difference! Now, I also haven't done a lot of "hard" work in FLEx for a while--mostly just looking up words, and adding a few, that come up in translation work. But I am able to use it 'natively'.

Machine specs: Lenovo X250, i5, 16 GB RAM, SSD.

For what it's worth,

Paul

[Nathan Straub 曹內森]

Thanks, everyone, for your helpful suggestions! 

Nathan

--

"FLEx list" messages are public. Only members can post.
flex_d...@sil.org
http://groups.google.com/group/flex-list.
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "FLEx list" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to flex-list+...@googlegroups.com.

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/flex-list/54ccaaa7-eccc-43b3-af30-4559b3bbdf19n%40googlegroups.com.

[DennisW]

It has been nearly a year now since earlier posts on this thread. Does anyone have a success story running FLEx in Windows 11 using Parallels or other VM platform on an M1 Mac?

I would expect it to work fine. Or at least whatever limitations you find should be the same as running FLEx natively in Windows 11. You would still need to have adequate RAM and storage for the scale of work you want to do.

Dennis

[John Brownie]

For an M1 Mac, options are limited. VMware Fusion does not work. Parallels does, but requires a special version of Windows which runs on the ARM architecture. I don't know how well or if SIL software runs on that version of Windows. I imagine that VirtualBox would require the same sort of version of Windows, if it works at all.

John

--

"FLEx list" messages are public. Only members can post.
flex_d...@sil.org
http://groups.google.com/group/flex-list.
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "FLEx list" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to flex-list+...@googlegroups.com.

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/flex-list/2906d405-2cab-4c1f-aa6e-dde023abc903n%40googlegroups.com.

--
John Brownie
Mussau-Emira language, New Ireland Province, Papua New Guinea
Turku, Finland

[Jonathan Robie]

I believe Paratext runs on an M1 Mac using a Windows 11 guest and Parallels.  Has anyone tried this combination with Fieldworks?

Jonathan

[jeff_...@sil.org]

Jonathan,

 

You request reminds me that I never got my Flex project to parse well on its on because of so many homophones and allophones. But it also reminded me of the excellent Sena project that the linguist extraordinaire Barb Heins did in the early days of Fieldworks. Sena is a Bantu language and highly agglutinative.  The project is still around for training.  Have you all looked at it?

 

Jeff Shrum

Translation Consultant in Training

SIL International

Dallas, TX USA

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/flex-list/f70259af-ff6b-48e8-b1fe-c1d26ecabd02n%40googlegroups.com.

[Jonathan Robie]

I would love to look at that. Who do I talk to if I want to be added to the Sena project?

Is there a biblical Hebrew model in FLEx?

Jonathan

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/flex-list/00a001d84519%24f612b630%24e2382290%24%40sil.org.

[jeff_...@sil.org]

Jonathan,

 

There are sample projects available Here:

Sample Projects - FieldWorks (sil.org)

 

Jeff Shrum

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/flex-list/CAMkatscV0ea_Yx7mBBA9JuSt%3DLqtG1HqOi9X2GucNeZTi1pSfA%40mail.gmail.com.

[Kari Valkama]

Hi Kate, 

I bought a MacBook Pro with M1 processor in June 2022. I also bought Parallels 17 and installed Windows 11 for ARM via Parallels. It works fine. 

Yours,, 

Kari

Kate Charlwood <kcharl...@gmail.com> kirjoitti 31.8.2022 kello 1.39:

Hi all,

Has anyone had any success running FLEx on M1 or M2 via Parallels and Windows? 

I just tried using Parallels and Linux (Ubuntu 22.04 arm64) on my M2 and had no luck: 

"N: Skipping acquire of configured file 'main/binary-arm64/Packages' as repository 'http://packages.sil.org/ubuntu jammy InRelease' doesn't support architecture 'arm64'."

Thanks,

Kate

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/flex-list/9e08ea35-b23f-4028-9e7a-a7322a2bef36n%40googlegroups.com.

[Kari Valkama]

HI Neige, 

Yes, Windows 11 works with Parallels. 

At the moment I am using Windows 11 Home with Parallels 18. 

Yours, 

Kari 

neig...@gmail.com <neig...@gmail.com> kirjoitti 3.4.2023 kello 17.37:

Hi everyone,

Thank you Kari for your helfpul answer to a question I had after I acquired a MacBook Pro. Do you know if Windows 11 Family works with Parallels?

Thank you very much in advance,

Best wishes,

Neige

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/flex-list/ddd8c042-8cb5-411d-8f7f-60946c96d4d3n%40googlegroups.com.

[Neige Rochant]

Hi Kari,

Thank you very much for your response!

Best,

Neige

You received this message because you are subscribed to a topic in the Google Groups "FLEx list" group.
To unsubscribe from this topic, visit https://groups.google.com/d/topic/flex-list/IS80wT9twmw/unsubscribe.
To unsubscribe from this group and all its topics, send an email to flex-list+...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/flex-list/F0563F72-38CD-4424-8CCB-E374743D687E%40mac.com.