has anyone made any further progress here?
Hello, i have obtained good results by installing in a new prefix with this commands :
export WINEPREFIX=~/.local/share/wineprefixes/roots8
export WINEARCH=win32
winetricks arch=32 prefix=roots8 win10
wineboot -k -s
winetricks prefix=roots8 crypt32
winetricks prefix=roots8 wininet
cat >/tmp/browser$$.reg <<EOF
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Wine\DllOverrides]
"*crypt32"="builtin,native"
"*wininet"="builtin,native"
EOF
wine regedit /tmp/browser$$.reg
rm -f /tmp/browser$$.reg
winetricks prefix=roots8 dxvk
winetricks prefix=roots8 gdiplus
winetricks prefix=roots8 corefonts
winetricks prefix=roots8 windowscodecs
winetricks prefix=roots8 win10
wine RootsMagic8Setup.exe
wine version : wine-7.0 (Staging)
OS : debian bullseye
I’ve been meaning to post an update for a while. Thanks for asking cat6man.
Back in November, I said I was still having “glitches”. Actually, it was only one huge glitch. Although the program would run, which was a huge breakthrough for me at the time, I couldn’t actually enter any data. When I clicked into any data entry field, the cursor would disappear in less than a second and I couldn’t type in that field. So, it was totally unusable at that point.
The weird thing was that I dug out an old desktop from the closet, which had Ubuntu 18.04 with Wine 4.0.3 and it worked just fine there. Lots of troubleshooting and experimenting ensued, trying to determine if it was an OS/Wine version issue or hardware/driver differences between the two computers. Meanwhile, Wine 7.0 was released and I installed that, but same symptom.
Finally, I found the right combination to get it working on my Ubuntu 20.04 laptop with Wine 7.0 (and now 7.1), and it was quite simple. Just Windows 10 with gdiplus. No need for ie8. No need for 32-bit environment. I think in my early experimentation when I tried 64-bit and Windows 10, I was switching the settings to Windows 10 only after initially starting with the default Windows 7, and that seems to be a bad idea. Start with Windows 10 right out of the gate, install gdiplus, install RM8, done. Why the older version of Wine was not so particular, I have no idea.
So to summarize my steps:
—Create a Wine prefix by running winecfg. Set the Windows Version to Windows 10
WINEPREFIX=(path)/RootsMagic8 winecfg
—Use winetricks to install gdiplus.
WINEPREFIX=(path)/RootsMagic8 (path)/winetricks gdiplus
—Install RootsMagic.
WINEPREFIX=(path)/RootsMagic8 wine (path)/RootsMagic8Setup.exe
—Run RootsMagic
WINEPREFIX=(path)/RootsMagic8 wine (path)/RootsMagic8/drive_c/RootsMagic/RootsMagic.exe
That’s what worked for me, anyway. Of course, everyone’s system is different, so others might have unique challenges and needs. That’s what makes Linux fun.
This has been a good discussion for this new person with linux. After a number of tries that did not work I finally found a post that said that on Mint 20 you needed to use the xfce version. I changed from Cinnamon to xfce and have RM 8 working on my laptop as just as good as my Windows Desktop. With Mint xfce I did not have to gdiplus but I did have to use 9 other dependencies. Gecko was not installed either.
Jim Mint 20.3 xfce Wine 7.0 stable
That sounds good. Are those 9 dependencies installed automatically, or do I still need to make some manual tweaks?
Would love to see the post that you found.
Enno
Here is the item with the needed items; Wine Stable 7.0 Released! How to Install in Ubuntu 20.04 / Linux Mint 20 | UbuntuHandbook
My Mint installation had the 1386 version activated so I skipped that instruction then installed the dependencies. At that point the rest was done as listed in the winehq.org installation instruction. When setting up to install RM 8 I selected Windows 10. After digging thru the various bad installs I had made I saw the the Windows 10 items had gdiplus item listed already so why do it again. I do have a list of several fixme’s that I have to figure out what is needed but sine RM 8 works for now I will do those later. I did over 12 installations on Mint Cinnamon that did not work including using the Mint packages that Mint said to install in the Release Notes. In searching the web I saw a article that said wine could not be installed on Mint 20 Cinnamon. I reinstalled Mint Cinnamon 8 times in the process of trying to get wine to work. At that point I saw a listing in some forum or another that the person said their Mint 20 wine install worked fine but he was using Mint xfce.
I used the reference above because I am not a good typist and it would take me about an hour to type the dependencies listed therein.
I first setup my Mint Laptop 2 weeks ago. I had not even looked at Linux for the 20 years so it is all new to me.
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OK, thanks. I noticed that those are the normal steps to install a newer Wine version than is offered in the software manager, and I had the same problem as you had, trying to run RM8 on the Cinnamon version. And since Mint got quite a bit heavier since LMDE 2, Xfce is a nice way to get good performance too.
After the 1st install, I was glad to see the program running, since it crashed on Cinnamon, but I couldn’t really use it, because I got no stable cursor in the username and password entry fields for FamilySearch. Mouse clicks didn’t work well in the People view either, and I didn’t know how you selected Windows 10 during the installation, because you don’t have that when you use the standard Wine install.
I then realized that you might have used WineTricks or PlayOnLinux to install, and got it to work with the latter, opting for 32 bits and Windows 10, and now RM 8 seems to be quite happy, and is actively downloading from FamilySearch, just to test how stable it is. Such a download often caused all sorts of memory errors in a VirtualBox with 4 GB RAM, but now it has my full 8 GB real RAM, and that looks much better!
I’m on my desktop now, but plan to try the same approach on my laptop, which is now running Mint 20 MATE. And I hope that you like Mint. I grew up with Unix in the 80’s, so it’s sort of home to me.
And stubborn as I am, but not as persistent as you were, with 12 installations on Cinnamon, I tried it on my laptop too, with Mint 20.3 MATE, using PlayOnLinux to set up a 32 bit Windows 10 environment, and that works too.
This is quite nice to know, because I like MATE a bit more than Xfce, and being able to run RM 8 without the performance loss created by VirtualBox is a much nicer way to run RootsMagic next to Gramps than before.
I got Windows 10 by using winecfg and setting it after mono was installed. Winecfg never ask to install Gecko so I did not bother to. RM 8 is based on 64 bit and my laptop is 64 bit Windows 10 seemed natural. RM 8 installed the location module but did not offer the Edge browser extensions. I went to linux because my laptop is old and will not support Windows 11. At 83 years old why buy a new laptop. Easier to try linux. Now I have to dig into linux a lot deeper.
Are you sure about that need for gdiplus? When I tried to install that with winetricks today, my log windows showed a checksum error, which suggests that it was not installed. And RM 8 still seems to be working fine, on Linux Mint 20.3 MATE.
I dug through all the various folders and files that were installed. I had set winecfg to Windows 10 and when I found the Windows 10 file one if the items there was gdiplus. I am new to linux so I am sloppy with some checks and balances and tend to ignore checksums. My test is does it work, if it does fine if not start worrying about the logs. Ant to tell the truth I had forgotten gdiplus when I made the install that worked and wondered why. I then dug deeper into what was installed and found it in the Windows 10 folder. BTW I have moved my laptop to MATE as I was not very happy with xfce and you said you were on MATE. Thank you for that suggestion.
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Today, I’m not that happy anymore. And that’s because yesterday, I found that RM 8 could not complete the import of a large GEDCOM (> 300,000 persons), and today it could not pdate itself to version 8.1.7.
In both cases, the program just stopped somewhere in the middle, without any type of error message, and had to be closed the hard way. And both actions work perfectly fine in Windows, although RM 8 sometimes doesn’t like my Gramps GEDCOM. In that case, I do see an error message in Windows though.
I need to correct myself a bit, because the import on Windows failed too, and that behavior seems to be linked to a focus problem. When an import takes long, and although RM is quite fast, importing 300,000 people need a few minutes, I may change focus to Firefox to visit Facebook, or this forum, and in that case, there is no way to go back to the import dialog, only to the RM 8 main window, which is empty, because the import has not completed yet. And both on Linux and Windows, I see no way out of this, other than to kill the program.
it seems i have found a way (finally) to get rm8 working for me under ubuntu.
the key seems to have been to first install
libnss-mdns:i386
after that, it installed fine with playonlinux (without gdiplus)
i have not yet tried it as a native 64bit program, which i’ll try next, as i’d like it to run a bit faster.
it has always been slow, particularly when doing large descendant displays.
i’m planning on upgrading from my 6i7 NUC one of these days with more RAM
i have only tried the free/test version, so YMMV
update: i did a 2nd installation with windows 10 and 64bit, and it went fine.
wooooohooooo, i may be ready to upgrade to the full version (finally)
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That’s great news @cat6man, thank you for sharing.
I’ve just migrated my desktop to Ubuntu 20.04.4 LTS. I’ve also set up a VirtualBox environment that I was planning to use for RM 8 but after reading this thread, I might go for the Wine route instead.
I’m a total newbie when it comes to Wine and it’s the first time that i heard about playonlinux. Is there any chance that you can share all the steps involved in setting up the environment?
ooops…the program loads fine, inputs files but i still have one serious problem.
i cannot get keyboard focus, as in i can’t type into the search bar or edit anything.
the mouse works fine but the keyboard is still an issue.
@B_Synnerlig
0. install libnss-mdns:i386 on your linux pc
- install playonlinux
- install, then install a non-listed program
- give virtual drive a name (i use rm8)
- select configure wine
- choose 64 bit
- select windows10, then apply
- select the rm8 setup file and install
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You may try adding gdiplus.
I have it working on my laptop, with Linux Mint MATE 20.3, and would love to find a way to export Wine settings in such a way that I can reuse them on another machine, so that I won’t have to go through the trial and error again.
You may also try 32 bit instead.
i tried adding gdiplus to my 32 bit installation, and it did not solve the problem here.
another possible clue: while the mouse works, it seems to be very slow when placed in a text entry box,
flashes a vertical line once, then disappears (rather than blink).
i’ve seem some (unrelated to rm8) posts that suggest that there may be issues matching screen resolution that can cause similar problems.
I just ran another test on Linux Mint Debian Edition 5, with Wine 7.0, and on that, it seems to be enough to set the Windows version to 10, with winecfg. I tested this by downloading my tree from FamilySearch, which is only possible when there is a working cursor in the username and password fields, and that worked. I see a small problem with the generation settings in the import window, but I can live with that.
PS: I forgot to mention that I installed RM 8 without the browsing enhancement extension.
Thanks for this thread! I tried again to install with the latest version and it works! One less thing I use that needs windows.