Microsoft .net Apps On Ubuntu - Possible?

[Thanh-BKK]

Hi.

As this is Thailand-related i'll ask here first. I have found a great application that is essentially an electronic dictionary which is able to translate words, sentences, whole paragraphs or even whole websites from Thai into English(splitting the long "one word sentences" into single Thai words, phonetic words and finally into word-by-word English translation).

This is not freeware, i have in fact bought it (1,200 Baht, a license key can be used for personal purpose on as many computers as desired) and i LOVE it.

Downside? It requires .net 2.0 to install and run, and i use Linux, Ubuntu to be precise.

Now on my main box i have a speedy dual-core and a bucket full of RAM, no issues to install it under Windows XP which, obviously, runs inside a virtual machine under VMware Workstation. At max 10% CPU load that doesn't put me under stress and it is fast and "snappy" to use.

However on my laptop? Single core. Also a bucket full of RAM however there the CPU load when running XP under VMware Workstation is exceeding 50%, running this app on top is more like 60-70%. That does not only get pretty warm but also runs the battery down REALLY fast.

Now i am looking for a way to coax this application to somehow run under Ubuntu directly. I have tried Wine - it fails upon install when it attempts to download .net framework from Microsoft, Wine in fact freezes at that point.

Installing the .net framework from a standalone installer file into Wine fails as well, without freeze but fails nevertheless.

Now i heard about something called "Mono" or similar but seems difficult.

Any advise how i could get this done..?

Kind regards......

Thanh

[jhs]

To my recollection, Mono is included in the default Ubuntu system. You probably already have it installed. Worst-case, search through Synaptic and install mono-runtime (I believe).

While Mono is .Net 2.0 compatible, those who promote Mono are quick to emphasize that it is not intended as a tool to run Windows apps on Linux (and a Mac for that matter). It is primarily a system that allows Linux developers to make applications as quickly and headache-free as Windows developers do. Put another way, definitely give it a shot; but unless your tool was specifically written with Mono in mind, it is unlikely to work. All you need is one "C:\Program Files\blah\blah\blah" in the program and it won't work on Linux. Like Java, Mono programs are run from the command-line by typing "mono", a space, and then the program. You could probably right-click on your .exe file, select "open with other application...", and enter "mono" as the custom command.

The thing is, an Idle Windows XP should be very near 0% CPU. You might consider investigating your Windows system to see if it is running any sort of background software. (I am thinking Spyware in particular.) If possible, consider a fresh install of Windows. I believe newer versions of VMWare Workstation allow you to run an application in (e.g.) XP but have that window appear in your normal GNOME desktop. So you don't have this ugly computer-in-a-computer to deal with.

[Thanh-BKK]

Hi.

Thank you for the reply. Yes, it appears Mono is installed on my system however i can't find it anywhere..... typing "mono" in a terminal explains some additional possibilities, however right-clicking the "exe" of that program gives no "Mono" option, and using "custom command" and then "mono" does nothing.

I guess the problem is that the program requires .net upon install, not only to run......

As to my CPU loads, the load inside Windows is indeed 0% however on Ubuntu (with VMWare Workstation and Windows XP therein being the only things running) it is roughly 50%. However that is a laptop with a slow-ish single core CPU and 2 GB of RAM, probably not the optimum for virtualization. As to the "computer-in-a-computer", my way around that is "fullscreen" - when i start Windows it is as if i had booted into Windows.

That Windows install is definitely clean, no spyware or viruses in there - used exclusively to run my favourite image editing program "iPhoto Plus" which is more than 10 years old and refuses to run in Wine...... and i do have an up-to-date Avast in there as well and Windows itself (genuine XP Home) is up to date as well. Apart from that only Firefox and RAMpage are installed.

Kind regards.....

Thanh

[2Na]

Did you try running it with wine and windows.net on it?

http://appdb.winehq.org/appview.php?iVersionId=3754 <--- they gave it Gold on the latest Ubuntu

[Thanh-BKK]

Hi

Thank you very much for that!! I didn't know about "winetricks" before. No i do I managed to get .net installed (2.0 as requested by my program) and then the program itself, too.

However it doesn't work..... it installed fine and is available under Wine, clicking that will start the database creation process (as it does under Windows, this initial process sort of configures the dictionary and takes some 10 minutes but only runs once after install) however instead of showing the "database is being initialized" window, taking those 10 minutes and then starting the actual application under Wine it only starts the database thing (t2e-dbsetup.exe in System Monitor) which uses some 40% CPU for a few seconds and then becomes a "zombie".

So i feel i am about half way there At least it's installed without errors.

Kind regards.....

your Thanh

[Richard-BKK]

Hello Thanh,

Maybe I can help, first if the program you are using is made-in-Thailand you likely need, additional to .net the MS visual-basic-libraries. Lots of Thai programmers still create software in Microsoft Visual Basic and Wine doesn't, for obvious license reasons, support this libraries – but I'm sure that if you search for Visual Basic libraries you find them. (I cannot guarantee that this will fix your problem, but your problem looks similar to something I had a few months ago).

I found that Vmware Workstation 7 runs slow if I run it on-top of Ubuntu 9.10 64-bits version, running the 64-bit version of Vmware Workstation and have as guest 32-bits Windows XP Professional running. If I run Vmware 32-bits on Ubuntu 9.10 32-bits with as guest OS Windows XP professional it runs on regular speed.

With the introduction of Crossover Linux 8 Professional, I have less need for VMWare as I'm now able to run most of my Windows software directly without the need of a heavy Virtual Machine. For some programs (Adobe Dreamweaver CS3) I have the feeling that it works even faster, smoother then running it under Windows 7...

Edited January 25, 2010 by Richard-BKK

[Thanh-BKK]

Hi Richard

Thank you for your reply. If i give you a link to that software, would you mind testing for me if it runs in Crossover Linux? As i understand that Crossover Linux is commercial software, i don't want to spend money on something if it doesn't work. I also have one more software which i would send you (you can PM me an e-mail address that is able to take larger attachments) that i would be happy if it would work - as it does not in Wine. Namely my good old iPhoto Plus, my favourite image editing program. It came free along with a scanner in 1999... so it is fairly old, still i prefer it over any other.

As to the software in question here, there's a thread running in the Thai language forum as well and i have been contacted by the author of the software, a Linux version may appear sooner or later and i offered to beta-test it, so i believe it is not considered advertising when i link to it here. It is called "Thai2English" and you can download a trial version (which should be sufficient to test as it will work for 14 days) from here:

http://www.thai2english.com/downloading/

If this happens to work in Crossover Linux i am going to get that. I don't mind paying for software if it does a job, i also paid for the license for Thai2English.

As for the other one (iPhoto) i don't have an installer but the zipped program folder is 5.5 Megabytes. On a Windows-Machine this is sitting in C:\Programs (NOT Program Files!!) and works pretty much standalone, i.e. with the folder on a thumb drive i can run it on any Windows machine, from Win95 to Vista. It does not create any registry entries. Sending this to you would NOT be piracy as this used to be freeware back when it was still available, it could be downloaded from Ulead. Obviously they no longer have it available. When trying to run it on Wine Wine complains about "insufficient memory or system resources low".

By the way (regarding the VM) i am running 32-bit Ubuntu and no issues with slowdowns in the virtual machines, i can run it like native on both my desktop as well as the laptop, however on the laptop it generates quite a high CPU load. But then that laptop is not very powerful, CPU-wise.

Kind regards......

your Thanh