WINE (WINdows Emulator) Frequently Asked Questions
Dave Gardner
Posting-Frequency: monthly
Last-modified: 31 Jan 1994 09:00:00 PDT
Version: 2.8
Wine Frequently Asked Questions
February/March 1995
Special Note: Sorry to be out so late with this posting of the FAQ, but I
had a spot of trouble getting a few message header changes approved by the
folks at MIT, and without securing that approval, my posting would have
been automatically cancelled.
This is the FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) for the Wine development
project. It contains both general and technical information about Wine:
project status, what it is and what it does, how to obtain and configure
and run it, and more. Please read this FAQ carefully before you post
questions about Wine to Usenet to see if your question is already answered
here first.
NOTE: If you are reading this FAQ and it is March 31, 1995 or later, this
document is out of date. Please get a new one from sources outlined below.
The following answers have changed since the last issue of this FAQ:
4.1 -- (minor change to thepoint.com's directory name)
Please note that since Wine is still alpha code, it may or may not work to
varying degrees on your system. Neither the Wine developers nor the Wine
FAQ author/maintainer can be held responsible for any damage that may be
caused to your computer hardware or software by your obtaining,
installing, configuring, operating and/or removing Wine.
Also please note that it is virtually impossible at this time to compile a
comprehensive list of MS Windows programs that run under Wine. A program
that runs under the current release of Wine probably won't under the next,
and things break and get fixed over and over constantly. As development
proceeds and programs don't break so easily, I'll be able to include such
a list in this FAQ. Till then, please consult the newsgroup
comp.emulators.ms-windows.wine for week-to-week reports by Wine users and
testers.
This FAQ will be posted monthly to these newsgroups:
comp.answers
comp.emulators.announce
comp.emulators.ms-windows.wine
comp.os.386bsd.announce
comp.os.linux.answers
comp.windows.x.i386unix
news.answers
It is also available by anonymous ftp from:
tsx-11.mit.edu:/pub/linux/ALPHA/Wine/Wine.FAQ
rtfm.mit.edu:/pub/usenet-by-newsgroup/comp.emulators.ms-windows.wine/
WINE_(WINdows_Emulator)_Frequently_Asked_Questions
aris.com:/pub/linux/ALPHA/Wine/Wine.FAQ
sunsite.unc.edu:/pub/Linux/ALPHA/wine/Wine.FAQ
ftp.netcom.com:/pub/an/andrew/Wine/Wine.FAQ
and quite likely most of the other sites around the globe that mirror the
Wine distribution from the Wine project's main distribution site,
tsx-11.mit.edu.
This FAQ is also available on the World Wide Web (WWW), reachable with any
web browser such as Mosaic or Netscape, or the ASCII browser lynx, at the
following URL:
http://www.primenet.com/~pdg/wine-faq.html
If you have any technical questions about Wine, please post these
have any suggestions for corrections, changes, expansion or
further clarification of this FAQ, please send them to the Wine FAQ author
and maintainer listed in question 7.2.
Here is a list of the topics covered in this issue of the Wine FAQ:
Section 1
Overview
1.1 What is Wine, and what is it supposed to do?
1.2 What does the word Wine stand for?
1.3 What is the current version of Wine?
1.4 When will Wine be ready for general distribution?
Section 2 -- Program Compatibility
2.1 Which MS Windows programs does wine currently run?
2.2 Which MS Windows programs do you expect wine never to be able to
run at all, and for what reason(s)?
2.3 Will MS Windows programs typically run faster or slower under
Unix and Wine than they do under MS-DOS and MS Windows? Will
certain kinds of programs run slower or faster?
2.4 Are there any advantages or disadvantages to running MS
Windows applications under wine that I should be aware of?
2.5 Will Wine support MS Windows networked applications that use
WINSOCK.DLL?
2.6 I'm a software developer who wants to use Unix to develop
programs rather than MS-DOS, but I need to write MS-DOS
and MS Windows programs as well. Will I be able to run my
favorite MS-DOS and/or MS Windows compilers under Wine?
Section 3
Hardware/Software Considerations
3.1 Under what hardware platform(s) and operating system(s)
will Wine run?
3.2 What minimum CPU must I have on my computer to be able to
run Wine and MS Windows applications smoothly?
3.3 How much disk space will the Wine source code and binaries
take on my hard drive?
3.4 How much RAM do I need to have on my Unix system to be able
to run Wine and MS Windows applications smoothly?
3.5 I have a Doublespaced or Stackered MS-DOS partition. Can Wine
run MS Windows binaries located in such a partition?
3.6 Do I need to have a MS-DOS partition on my system to use
Wine? Does MS Windows need to be loaded into that partition in
order to run MS Windows programs under Wine?
3.7 If Wine completely replaces MS Windows, will it duplicate all
of the functions of MS Windows?
3.8 Will I be able to install MS Windows applications in any Unix
filesystem?
3.9 Will Wine run only under X, or can it run in character mode?
3.10 Will Wine run under any X window manager?
3.11 What happens when Windows '95 is released? Will 32-bit Windows
applications run under Wine?
Section 4
How to Find, Install, Configure and Run Wine
4.1 Where can I get Wine?
4.2 If I do not have an Internet account, how can I get Wine?
4.3 How do I install Wine on my hard drive?
4.4 How do I compile the Wine distribution source code?
4.5 How do I configure Wine to run on my system?
4.6 How do I run an MS Windows program under Wine?
4.7 I have installed and configured Wine, but Wine cannot find
MS Windows on my drive. Where did I go wrong?
4.8 I think I've found a bug. How do I report this bug to the
Wine programming team?
4.9 I was able to get various MS Windows programs to run, but
their menus do not work. What is wrong?
4.10 I have run various MS Windows programs but since the program
menus do not work, how can I exit these programs?
4.11 How do I remove Wine from my computer?
Section 5
How To Get Help
5.1 Is there a Usenet newsgroup for Wine?
5.2 Is there a gopher site set up for Wine?
5.3 Is there a WWW site set up for Wine information?
5.4 Is there a mailing list for Wine?
Section 6
How You Can Help
6.1 How can I help contribute to the Wine project, and in
what way(s)?
6.2 I want to help beta test Wine. How can I do this?
6.3 I have written some code that I would like to submit
to the Wine project. How do I go about doing this?
Section 7
Who is Responsible for Wine
7.1 Who is responsible for writing and maintaining the Wine
source code?
7.2 Who is responsible for writing and maintaining the Wine FAQ?
7.3 Who are the folks and organizations who have contributed money
or equipment to the Wine project?
And now, the answers to the questions:
Section 1
Overview
1.1 What is Wine, and what is it supposed to do?
Wine is both a program loader and an emulation library that will allow
Unix users to run MS Windows applications on an x86 hardware platform
running under some Unixes. The program loader will load and execute an MS
Windows application binary, while the emulation library will take calls to
MS Windows functions and translate these into calls to Unix/X, so that
equivalent functionality is achieved.
MS Windows binaries will run directly; there will be no need for machine
level emulation of program instructions. Sun has reported better
performance with their version of WABI than is actually achieved under MS
Windows, so theoretically the same result is possible under Wine.
1.2 What does the word Wine stand for?
The word Wine stands for one of two things: WINdows Emulator, or Wine Is
Not an Emulator. Both are right. Use whichever one you like best.
1.3 What is the current version of Wine?
A new version of Wine will be distributed almost every week, usually on a
Saturday or Sunday. You will be able to keep up on all the latest releases
by reading the newsgroup comp.emulators.ms-windows.wine.
When downloading Wine from your ftp site of choice (see question 4.1 for
some of these choices), you can make sure you are getting the latest
version by watching the version numbers in the distribution filename. For
instance, the distribution released on June 20, 1994 was called
Wine-940620.tar.gz.
Weekly patches are also available. If you are current to the previous
version, you can download and apply just the current patch file rather
than the entire new distribution. The patch filenames follow the same
conventions as the weekly distribution, so watch those version numbers!
1.4 When will Wine be ready for general distribution?
Because Wine is being developed solely by volunteers, it is difficult to
predict when it will be ready for general distribution. Between 90-98% of
the functions used by MS Windows applets, and 80-90% of the functions used
by major programs, have been at least partially implemented at this time.
However, the remaining 10% will likely take another 90% of the time, not
including debugging.
Section 2
Program Compatibility
2.1 Which MS Windows programs does wine currently run?
A number of public domain and shareware games programs found on the ftp
site cica.indiana.edu can run under Wine, to varying degrees of success.
Since Wine is still under development, programs may break and new programs
may begin to run from week to week, so it is virtually impossible to
publish a complete and accurate list in a monthly document like this FAQ.
To the best of my knowledge at the time of this writing, no one is
currently compiling a comprehensive list of commercial MS Windows
applications known to run under Wine. However, some of the aplets
distributed with MS Windows, such as WINMINE.EXE, SOL.EXE and others, do
run to a certain degree.
Keep an eye on the newsgroup comp.emulators.ms-windows.wine for weekly
changes.
2.2 Which MS Windows programs do you expect Wine never to be able to
run at all, and for what reason(s)?
Any MS Windows program that requires a special enhanced mode device driver
(VxD) that cannot be rewritten specifically for Wine, will not run under
Wine.
2.3 Will MS Windows programs typically run faster or slower under Unix
and Wine than they do under MS-DOS and MS Windows? Will certain
kinds of programs run slower or faster?
Programs should typically run at about the same speed under Wine as they
do under MS Windows.
2.4 Are there any advantages or disadvantages to running MS Windows
applications under wine that I should be aware of?
As with OS/2, you will be running 16-bit MS Windows applications in a
32-bit operating system using emulation techniques, so you will have
similar advantages and disadvantages.
There will be crash protection. That is, each MS Windows application
running under Wine will be running in its own X window and its own portion
of reserved memory, so that if one MS Windows application crashes, it will
not crash the other MS Windows or Unix applications that you may have
running at the same time.
Also, MS Windows programs should run at about the same speed under Wine as
they do under MS Windows. When Wine is finished, you will be able to run
your favorite MS Windows applications in a Unix environment.
However, be aware that any application written for a 16-bit operating
system will run much less efficiently than its 32-bit cousin, so if you
find a 32-bit application that fits your needs, you will be much better
off switching.
2.5 Will Wine support MS Windows networked applications that use
WINSOCK.DLL?
Yes, Wine will support such applications. You will be able to run MS
Windows applications such as Netscape, Mosaic and Cello, although there
are 32-bit Unix versions of the first two now.
2.6 I'm a software developer who wants to use Unix to develop programs
rather than MS-DOS, but I need to write MS-DOS and MS Windows
programs as well. Will I be able to run my favorite MS-DOS
and/or MS Windows compilers under Wine?
DOSEMU, the MS-DOS emulator for Linux, is currently not able to run either
the Microsoft C/C++ or Borland C/C++ compilers because it lacks DPMI
(MS-DOS protected mode interface) support. Wine is not an MS-DOS emulator,
so it cannot run these compilers either. Wine is not currently able to run
any MS Windows debuggers, and may not be able to for some time.
Wine is being designed to run existing MS Windows applications. Be aware
too that a custom MS Windows program specifically written to be compatible
with Wine may not work the same as when it is run under MS-DOS and MS
Windows.
Section 3
Hardware/Software Considerations
3.1 Under what hardware platform(s) and operating system(s) will
Wine run?
Wine is being developed specifically to run on the Intel x86 class of CPUs
under certain Unixes that run on the x86 platform. Unixes currently being
tested for Wine compatibility include Linux, NetBSD and FreeBSD. The Wine
development team hopes to attract the interest of commercial Unix and Unix
clone vendors as well.
3.2 What minimum CPU must I have in my computer to be able to run
Wine and MS Windows applications smoothly?
Wine is currently being developed specifically for use on Intel x86 CPUs,
and needs a minimum 80386 CPU. It is known to also work in the 80486 and
Pentium CPUs. Beyond that, the basic test is, if you can run X11 now, you
should be able to run Wine and MS Windows applications. As always, the
faster your CPU, the better. Having a math coprocessor is unimportant.
However, having a graphics accelerated video card supported by X will help
greatly.
3.3 How much disk space will the Wine source code and binaries take
on my hard drive?
It is anticipated that when Wine is completed, you will need approximately
6-8 megabytes of hard drive space to store and compile the source code.
3.4 How much RAM do I need to have on my Unix system to be able to
run Wine and MS Windows applications smoothly?
If you can run X smoothly on your Unix system now, you should be able to
run Wine and MS Windows applications just fine too. A Wine workstation
should realistically have at least 8 megabytes of RAM and a 12 megabyte
swap partition. More is better, of course.
3.5 I have a Doublespaced or Stackered MS-DOS partition. Can Wine run
MS Windows binaries located in such a partition?
Only if the operating system supports mounting those types of drives.
Currently, NetBSD and FreeBSD do not. However, there is a patch for the
Linux kernel that allows read-only access to a Doublespaced DOS partition,
and it's available on sunsite.unc.edu as:
/pub/Linux/system/Filesystems/thsfs.tgz (12076 bytes)
3.6 Do I need to have a MS-DOS partition on my system to use Wine?
Does MS Windows need to be loaded into that partition in order
to run MS Windows programs under Wine?
You do not need DOS or MS Windows to install, configure and run Wine.
However, Wine has to be able to 'see' an MS Windows binary if it is to run
it. So, currently, you do need to have a DOS partition with MS Windows
installed on your hard drive to use Wine in a practical manner. Your Unix
OS must be able to 'see' this partition (check your /etc/fstab file or
mount the partition manually) in order for Wine to run MS Windows binaries
in your DOS partition.
However, when it is finished, Wine will not require that you have a MS-DOS
partition on your system at all, meaning that you will not need to have MS
Windows installed either. Wine programmers will provide an application
setup program to allow you to install your MS Windows programs straight
from your distribution diskettes into your Unix filesystem, or from within
your Unix filesystem if you ftp an MS Windows program over the Internet.
3.7 If Wine completely replaces MS Windows, will it duplicate all of
the functions of MS Windows?
Most of them, yes. However, some applications and aplets that come with MS
Windows, such as File Manager and Calculator, can be considered by some to
be redundant, since 32-bit Unix programs that duplicate these functions
already exist.
3.8 Will I be able to install MS Windows applications in any Unix
filesystem?
Wine is written to be filesystem independent, so MS Windows applications
will install and run under any filesystem supported by your brand of Unix.
3.9 Will Wine run only under X, or can it run in character mode?
Being a GUI (graphical user interface), MS Windows does not have a
character mode, so there will be no character mode for Wine. So yes, you
must run Wine under X.
3.10 Will Wine run under any X window manager?
Wine is window manager independent, so the X window manager you choose to
run has absolutely no bearing on your ability to run MS Windows programs
under Wine. Wine uses standard X libraries, so no additional ones are
needed.
3.11 What happens when Windows '95 is released? Will 32-bit Windows
applications run under Wine?
Wine developers do eventually plan on supporting Win32s, but such support
is not in the current version of Wine.
Section 4
How to Find, Install, Configure and Run Wine
4.1 Where can I get Wine?
Wine can now be found on quite a few systems throughout the Internet. Here
is an incomplete list of some of the systems and their directories in
which to find Wine:
tsx-11.mit.edu:/pub/linux/ALPHA/Wine/development
aris.com:/pub/linux/ALPHA/Wine
sunsite.unc.edu:/pub/Linux/ALPHA/wine
ftp.informatik.rwth-aachen.de:/pub/Linux/local/packs
ftp.thepoint.com:/linux/alpha/wine
ftp.funet.fi:/pub/OS/Linux/ALPHA/Wine
ftp.wonderland.org:/Wine
ftp.netcom.com:/pub/andrew/Wine
unix.hensa.ac.uk:/pub/linux/ALPHA/wine
Some of these ftp sites may archive previous versions of Wine as well as
the current one. To determine which is the latest one, look at the
distribution filename, which will take the form:
Wine-[yymmdd].tar.gz
Simply replace [yymmdd] in the distribution filename with the numbers for
year, month and date respectively. The latest one is the one to get.
Note that weekly diff patches are now available, so you don't have to
download, install and configure the entire distribution each week if you
are current to the previous release. Diff releases follow the same
numbering conventions as do the general releases, and take the form:
Wine-[yymmdd].diff.gz
Note that any mirror of tsx-11 will likely carry the Wine distribution as
well, and may not be listed here in this FAQ. If you are mirroring the
Wine distribution from the tsx-11 site and wish to be listed here in this
FAQ, please send email to the FAQ author/maintainer listed in question
7.2.
4.2 If I do not have an Internet account, how can I get Wine?
Sorry, but at this time, you are basically out of luck. Find a friend with
an Internet account and have him/her ftp the necessary files for you. If
you have an email account on a BBS that can reach the Internet through a
gateway, you may be able to use email to get the Wine release sent to you;
check with your BBS system operator for details.
If you are running a BBS that is not connected to the Internet but does
offer the Wine distribution for download, and would like to be listed in
this FAQ, please forward such information to the FAQ author/maintainer as
listed in question 7.2.
4.3 How do I install Wine on my hard drive?
Just un-gzip and un-tar the file, and follow the instructions contained in
the README file that will be located in the base Wine directory.
4.4 How do I compile the Wine distribution source code?
4.5 How do I configure Wine to run on my system?
All of the directions to perform these two steps are located in the README
file that will be located in the base Wine directory after you untar the
distribution file.
4.6 -- How do I run an MS Windows program under Wine?
Assuming you are running X already, call up a term window. Then, at the
shell prompt, type:
wine [/path/progname]
Another X window will pop up on top of the shell window and the binary
should begin to execute.
Let's assume that you want to run MS Windows Solitaire. Under MS-DOS, you
had installed MS Windows on your C: drive under the subdirectory /WINDOWS.
Under Unix, you have mounted the C: drive under /dos/c. To run MS Windows
Solitaire, you would type:
wine /dos/c/windows/sol.exe
4.7 I have installed and configured Wine, but Wine cannot find MS
Windows on my drive. Where did I go wrong?
First, make sure you have mounted your MS-DOS partition into your Unix
filesystem, either by putting the entry into /etc/fstab, or by manually
mounting it. Remember, it must not be located on a Doublespaced or
Stackered partition, as neither Linux, FreeBSD, NetBSD or Wine cannot
currently 'see' files located in such compressed DOS partitions.
Next, check your path statements in the 'wine.conf' file. No capital
letters may be used in paths, as they are automatically converted to
lowercase.
4.8 I think I've found a bug. How do I report this bug to the Wine
programming team?
Bug reports should be posted to the following newsgroup:
comp.emulators.ms-windows.wine.
4.9 I was able to get various MS Windows programs to run, but their
menus do not work. What is wrong?
Wine is not complete at this time, so the menus may not work. They will in
time as more of the MS Windows API calls are included in Wine.
4.10 I have run various MS Windows programs but since the program menus
do not work, how can I exit these programs?
Kill the shell window that you called up to run your MS Windows program,
and the X window that appeared with the program will be killed too.
4.11 How do I remove Wine from my computer?
All you have to do is to type:
rm -fR [/path/]Wine*
Make sure you specify the exact path when using the powerful 'rm -fR'
command. If you are afraid you might delete something important, or might
otherwise delete other files within your filesystem, change into each Wine
subdirectory singly and delete the files found there manually, one file or
directory at a time. Neither the Wine programmers nor the Wine FAQ
author/maintainer can be held responsible for your deleting any files in
your filesystem.
Section 5
How To Get Help
5.1 Is there a Usenet newsgroup for Wine?
Yes. It's called comp.emulators.ms-windows.wine, and the newsgroup's
charter states that it will consist of announcements and discussion about
Wine. The newsgroup serves as a place for developers to discuss Wine, and
for minor announcements for the general public. Major announcements will
be crossposted to other appropriate groups, such as the newsgroups
comp.os.linux.announce, comp.windows.x.announce and
comp.emulators.announce.
If your Usenet site does not carry this new newsgroup, please urge your
sysadmin and/or uplink to add it.
5.2 Is there a gopher site set up for Wine?
To the best of my knowledge at the time of this writing, no. If you are
installing or maintain a Gopher site pertaining to Wine, please contact
the FAQ author/maintainer as noted in question 7.2 for inclusion in the
next edition of the Wine FAQ.
5.3 Is there a WWW site set up for Wine information?
Here are the URLs for a few sites reachable with your favorite web
browser:
http://www.primenet.com/~pdg/wine-faq.html
http://www.thepoint.com/linux/ALPHA/wine/index.html
http://daedalus.dra.hmg.gb/gale/wine/wine.html
http://www.ifi.uio.no/~dash/wine/
If you are installing or maintain a WWW page pertaining to Wine, please
inform the FAQ author/maintainer as detailed in 7.2 for inclusion in the
next edition of the Wine FAQ.
5.4 Is there a mailing list for Wine?
There is a seldom-used developers-only mailing list, whose contents are
planned to be ported into comp.emulators.ms-windows.wine. If you are a
Wine developer, or want to become one, you are welcome to join the list.
Please leave a message on the newsgroup comp.emulators.ms-windows.wine
expressing your interest.
Those with a general interest in Wine should participate in the newsgroup.
Section 6
How You Can Help
6.1 How can I help contribute to the Wine project, and in what way(s)?
You can contribute programming skills, or monetary or equipment donations,
to aid the Wine developers in reaching their goal. To find out who, what,
where, when and why, please post your desire to contribute to the
newsgroup comp.emulators.ms-windows.wine.
6.2 I want to help beta test Wine. How can I do this?
Beta testers are currently not needed, as Wine is still Alpha code at this
time. However, anyone is welcome to download the latest version and try it
out at any time.
6.3 I have written some code that I would like to submit to the Wine
project. How do I go about doing this?
Send your weekly code contributions to the mail alias
'wine...@amscons.com'. You should still verify that your code was
included in the subsequent release of Wine, as project managers cannot
guarantee that the mail server will not suffer some computer failure that
will cause loss of your message and code after it is received.
Section 7
Who is Responsible for Wine
7.1 Who is responsible for writing and maintaining the Wine source
code?
Wine is available thanks to the work of Bob Amstadt, Dag Asheim, Martin
Ayotte, Erik Bos, John Brezak, Andrew Bulhak, John Burton, Peter Galbavy,
Jeffrey Hsu, Miguel de Icaza, Alexandre Julliard, Scott Laird, Martin von
Loewis, Jon Konrath, Peter MacDonald, David Metcalfe, Michael Patra, John
Richardson, Johannes Ruscheinski, Yngvi Sigurjonsson, Rick Sladkey,
William Smith, Jon Tombs, Carl Williams, Karl Guenter Wuensch, and Eric
Youngdale.
7.2 Who is responsible for writing and maintaining the Wine FAQ?
The FAQ is being maintained by Dave Gardner <p...@primenet.com>, who is not
connected with the Wine project in any way but as the FAQ
author/maintainer. Please do not send technical questions about the Wine
project to the FAQ maintainer, but rather post them to the newsgroup.
7.3 Who are the folks and organizations who have contributed money or
equipment to the Wine project?
People and organizations who have given generous contributions of money
and equipment include David L. Harper, Bob Hepple, Mark A. Horton, Kevin
P. Lawton, the Syntropy Institute, and James Woulfe.
--
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Dave Gardner | p...@primenet.com
S. Pasadena, CA | http://www.primenet.com/~pdg/dave-h.html
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