Cookie Consent by FreePrivacyPolicy.com

 

VirtualA5000 Technical support:
Running VirtualA5000 on Linux using WINE (Technical)

This article was originally published in RISCWorld Volume 4 Issue 2. Note that VirtualAcorn do not current support Linux, VirtualA5000 products are designed to run on Microsoft Windows. This article is provided for information only and VirtualAcorn do not support the use of our products on Linux. Please note that we are currently unable to provide further Linux support beyond the contents of this article. Also please note that only VirtualA5000 can be run in this way, the technique shown will not work for VirtualRPC products.

Running VirtualA5000 on Linux

There currently isn't a native Linux version of VirtualA5000. However, there are two ways to run Windows applications under Linux. Win4Lin and WINE (WINE stands for WIne is Not an Emulator). I've not used Win4Lin as I have heard some bad things about it.

When you download WINE, you have the choice on what you use. There is the choice of a tarball, rpm, srpm (source rpm) and apt (for Debian). The tarball and srpm versions are the source code versions. Fine if you want to mess around or have compiled code before, but it's not for everyone. Most users are happy with the compiled binary versions. You should also download winesetuptk (the WINE setup utility).

For RPM installation

  • Open a terminal window
  • Log in as su
  • Type rpm -ihv wine.rpm (or whatever the rpm is called)
  • Type rpm -ihv winesetuptk.rpm (or whatever the rpm is called)
  • Exit as su

For source installation

Below is for Redhat, it is similar for other distributions.

  • If you are using a SRPM, follow the RPM installation above followed by cd /usr/src/redhat/SOURCES
  • Type tar -zxf winesource.tar.gz
  • Type cd winesource
  • Type tools/wineinstall
  • The compiler will compile the source and if you said ”yes• when asked, will install WINE.

Run (from a terminal window) winesetuptk. You should be okay to just accept the default values.

Put the VA5000 CD in and mount the drive. You then need to do the following.

  • Open a terminal window
  • Type cd /mnt/cdrom
  • Type wine CDStarter.exe /c cdstarter.ini
  • Select the bits of VA you want to use.

The final part of the operation is to get hold of a copy of mfc42.dll and mscvrt.dll and place them in the same directory as the installation of VA5000. VA will not run without these two dlls. You can download these from the internet or anyone who has a Windows box (hmmm, looks like Windows may have a use after all!).

You can now start VA5000 via the command line via.

wine .wine/fake_windows/"Program Files"/VirtualAcorn/VirtualA5000/VirtualA5000.exe.

...which is a bit of a mouthful! Personally, I would do the following

ln -s .wine/fake_windows/"Program Files"/VirtualAcorn/VirtualA5000 VA5000.

That will make a symbolic link to the directory containing the VA5000 executable. This means you can type.

wine VA5000/VirtualA5000.exe

and VA will start. You now have a working installation of VA on a linux machine.

Why did I not just associate exe files with WINE?

Simple — if you do that then there can be problems if you use Mono (C# for Linux and other platforms). If you don't use Mono, then by all means, feel free to associate exe files with WINE. You will then be able to double click the VirtualA5000.exe file to execute it.

This article was written by Paul Johnson

[Home] [Products] [FAQ] [Order] [Contact] [Press Releases] [Tech Support] [Downloads]

 Copyright (c) 2021 3QD Developments Ltd. All rights reserved. All trademarks are acknowledged. All details are correct at the time of publication, E & OE.
Last Edit Date 31/03/21
info@virtualacorn.co.uk