Running Windows Programs with the Wine API

PRACTICAL WINE

Article from Issue 57/2005
Author(s):

The Wine compatibility layer lets Linux users run Windows programs. Unfortunately, configuring Wine is anything but trivial, and it helps if you enjoy experimenting.

Linux offers a number of options for users who need to run an occasional Windows program. You can emulate a complete machine using an application such as VMware or Qemu, or you can simulate a machine subset with Win4Lin. These solutions work quite well but also have some drawbacks: for one thing, users need to buy both the emulation environment and the operating system, both of which take up valuable space on the host machine. Emulation also taxes performance and soaks up memory. An average program running in an emulator will achieve just 50 to 80 percent of its normal native performance, even with increased static RAM memory use by the guest operating system. An alternative to emulation is simply to provide Windows libraries for the Linux system. In theory, this approach would allow the program to run in Linux. Unfortunately, this approach is complicated. First, the Windows library functions, or so called API (Application Programming Interface), is not adequately documented.

Buy this article as PDF

Express-Checkout as PDF
Price $2.95
(incl. VAT)

Buy Linux Magazine

SINGLE ISSUES
Print Issues
Digital Issues
 
SUBSCRIPTIONS
Print Subs
Digisubs
 
TABLET & SMARTPHONE APPS
Get it on Google Play

US / Canada

Get it on Google Play

UK / Australia

Related content

  • Practical Wine

    More and more Windows applications run on Linux thanks to Wine. If you spend a little time on configuration and troubleshooting, you won’t be stuck in Windows – even with applications that no one dreamed would run on Linux.

    more »
  • Tutorials – Wine

    Convert your home/office/friends to be completely Microsoft-free with our tips and tricks.

    more »
  • Green Wine: Q4Wine Tool in Version 0.113

    Q4Wine is a Qt4 program that manages Windows programs using the Wine emulator API. Version 0.113 shows a number of new features.

    more »
  • Gaming with Wine

    Although Linux has made great strides in gaming, users sometimes miss the games that are only available on Windows. Linux provides a way to solve this problem with Wine, the Windows "not an emulator."

    more »
  • Wine

    Users who move from Windows to Linux often miss some of their favorite programs and games. Wouldn't it be practical to run Windows applications on the free Linux operating system? Time for a little taste of Wine.

    more »
comments powered by Disqus

Visit Our Shop

Trial Subscription

Digital Subscription

Subscribe

Direct Download

Read full article as PDF:

Running_Windows_Programs_With_Wine.pdf (240.71 kB)

News

Tag Cloud

Administration Community Desktop Events Hardware Linux Linux Pro Magazine Mobile Programming Software Ubuntu Web Development Windows free software open source