[SOLVED] Several newbie questions

[Executioner]

I've been using Mint just under 2 years on a spare laptop to get use to the OS. I'm coming from Windows. I do have Wine installed, as I really missed the old WinAmp 2.90 version which has migrated on several windows versions during the years. With Wine installed and WinAmp, I have a WinAmp icon on the desktop that launches the program. I also installed Office 2003 and Office 2007 to see if it was possible to have both running under Wine, and I'm able to run both versions. Not sure about later versions of Office 2010, 2013, 2016, and 2019.

I also have VirtualBox running as well with Windows 7 Pro. In my experiences with VMWare and now VirtualBox, the better the CPU and more ram, the better it runs. On my laptop, I have only 6 gigs total ram on this old Lenovo T510 laptop. I'm assuming if you have a fast CPU and 16 gigs of ram, it should run quite well.
VirtualBox is easy to setup. I did not use the version from the software manager for my 18.3 Mint installation. I downloaded it directly from Oracle. The important piece is to install Guest Additions.

[Moonraker]

Do NOT feel bad about having to have some WIndows. There are no Linux equivalents for some Windows apps and that'll likely not change.

Thank you. Yes, there are more than a few Windows applications that don't have any good equivalents on the Linux side. I built sites for over a decade, I do a fair bit of graphics (not at a pro level but fair-to-middlin'), I do a *lot* of data transformations and import/export stuff, etc etc. There are a few utilities I've grown accustomed to that I've found reasonable replacements for, but the replacements are lacking in some serious ways.

For example, Tomboy Notes. It would work for me, except I have ~900 or so notes already stored in the AZZ Cardfile format. AZZ Cardfile will export to all sorts of custom formats, but Tomboy doesn't have any import capability at all, none, zero, zip. The bottom line is that if I can't transfer my data into it, I can't use Tomboy. I'm not going to type these things in all over again.

BTW for example anyone who tells you that Gimp is a fully acceptable alternative to Photoshop doesn't have 2 clues to rub together re graphics solutions.

I have tried on and off to use gimp for years now, but it's always frustrating. I've been testing Krita as a simple replacement, but it sure would be nice to fire up Photoshop or Coreldraw when needed.

I've installed Virtualbox and from what I gather, it needs an ISO to grab to make the VM. (Can't install it off of a CD, or so I'm told.)

Problem is, I can't find my usual Win7 install disk to make an ISO from, it's around here somewhere but I haven't found it yet. So, I went and downloaded the free ISO of Win7-IE8 from Microsoft in case I can't find the bloody thing. (The free one from MS expires every 90 days and then you have to re-activate it, so I'd rather use mine because it won't ever expire.)

[Moonraker]

Well, crap.

Hmmm...is it possible to downgrade from 19.1 to 19?

If I understand you correctly, I can still use VirtualBox with 19.1, but I won't get the extra taskbar and the windows will look more like Windows rather than Linux, is that correct? Because I think I could live with that at least until the official fix comes out, as long as I can run Windows programs in it.

My error, forgot to state that it was LM19.1 + cinnamon that has the problem

In seamless you get an additional panel, or taskbar above the mint panel and when you run a windows app it appears in its own window looking pretty much like any other linux app. There are some screenshots in my post here:

viewtopic.php?f=47&t=284141

But, if you are running LM19.1 and cinnamon you will have to wait for seamless, I'm sticking with LM19.0 until it's fixed.

[AndyMH]

If you did a fresh install of 19.1, yes, you would need to install 19.0 instead. I was upgrading from 19.0 to 19.1 and was able to go back to 19.0 using timeshift (a backup utility installed by default in LM 19 versions).

And yes, in full screen mode, win inside VB looks like windows (you will still be able to cut and paste between win and linux). I did toy with the idea of running VB and win in a separate workspace, but decided I preferred seamless so am sticking with LM19.0 until the bug is fixed.

I had to go out and buy a new win7 licence when I installed it, all the win7 licences I had (from PCs I'd wiped and replaced with linux) were OEM versions locked to the hardware. This was some time ago, and got it off either ebay or amazon.

[Moonraker]

Well, I installed VirtualBox and the Guest Additions, then loaded Win7 and MS Word, Excel, Powerpoint, etc.

All in all, it's kind-of-sort-of working, but it seems to have a lot of bugs.

• Drag and drop- sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes it'll work once and then never again for that session. When it doesn't work the VM hangs when trying to shutdown Windows.

• Shared clipboard- as above, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Usually it doesn't, but every once in a while it will. Then it stops just like drag and drop.
  
  Here's the VBox error when it fails:
  
  Drag and drop error from guest (VERR_INVALID_HANDLE).
  Result Code:
  VBOX_E_IPRT_ERROR (0x80BB0005)
  Component:
  GuestWrap
  Interface:
  IGuest {13a11514-402e-022e-6180-c3944de3f9c8}

• MS Word (2007) works somewhat, but it also blows up and and dies or stops working when I do certain things like update a table of contents. Word will load an ODF/ODT file from LibreOffice, but the formatting is almost always borked in some weird ways. Unfortunately, being able to use Word is one of the main reasons I installed VirtualBox. Arg.

• Shared directories- hell if I can figure out how to get this to work. I specify file paths and all the other stuff but it never seems to work. There's something about having to mount the shared folder but I don't know how to do that (at least not yet).

I had really high hopes for VirtualBox...not being able to reliably use MS Word is very disappointing to say the least.

Might it be worth trying Crossover?

Virtualbox runs fine on 19.1, there's only an issue with seamless mode on Cinnamon. Seamless mode is one of Virtualbox's display modes where the virtual machine contents get integrated with your regular desktop. It's pretty cool, you should try it out if you're not on Cinnamon, otherwise wait for the patch, a fix was already submitted. The other display modes should work without a problem even on Cinnamon.

[AndyMH]

I do have Wine installed, as I really missed the old WinAmp 2.90 version which has migrated on several windows versions during the years. With Wine installed and WinAmp, I have a WinAmp icon on the desktop that launches the program.

Also a fan of winamp, but now use audacious, think it might be installed by default - it can look like winamp and use winamp 2.x skins. This is the default winamp skin in audacious:

Screenshot from 2019-01-16 08-32-35.png

[AndyMH]

Virtualbox:

• Which version of VB and how did you install it?

• Have you installed the extension pack in mint?

• Assume you are a member of the vboxusers group?

• Have to say I don't use drag & drop - I've just tried it and it wouldn't work (and drag/drop is set up as bidirectional). I've always used copy/paste instead - just tested on a simple block of text and that worked. I also don't mix & match much between win and mint apps. If I'm working in win that's where I tend to stay and don't use mint apps (or v. infrequently) to support whatever I'm doing in win.

• I don't use libreoffice, or v occasionally - if I did why would I need office? The odd time I've opened a doc or xls (can't remember which) in libreoffice and saved it, I then found office wouldn't open it.

Apart from the bug with seamless and cinnamon in mint 19.1, I've found VB to be rock solid. Used to earn my living crunching large excel spreadsheets and had to have something I could rely on. Originally ran office 2013 in it and now use office 2016. To set up shared folders you need to goto settings for the VM you are running, click on the little blue + icon on the right of the screen to add/setup a new shared folder. You could share all of /home, but I think it's best to limit win's access to only what is needed. Shared folders appear as network drives in 'my computer' in win:

Screenshot from 2019-01-16 08-55-37.png

wrt crossover - I originally ran word and excel 2007 under wine (running mint 18.x) and then switched to crossover running word and excel 2013 (it does have the other components of office installed but don't use them). I've not had any significant problems with word/excel. Some bits are a bit clunky - crossover/wine maps /home and any other partitions mounted to drive letters and it's not always obvious where stuff is. I've found if you want to mess around with the formatting of a chart in excel, it is a lot easier to do it with excel in the win7 VM. Excel 2013 under crossover:

Oliveoil.xlsx - Excel_023.png

The only problems I've had with crossover are kindle and SmartDraw. Kindle used to work fine under mint 18.x and crossover 17.5, it won't work (or crashes frequently) under mint 19.0 and crossover 18.0 - don't know which one is at fault. SmartDraw is a visio look-a-like, used it for years, runs fine in Crossover, but failed repeatedly to get it to copy/paste into other apps, e.g. word running under Crossover. Gave up in the end and installed it in the win VM.

Crossover is not free, but think there is a 14 day free trial. For me it was worth the money ($39?).

[Moonraker]

Virtualbox:

• Which version of VB and how did you install it?

• Have you installed the extension pack in mint?

• Assume you are a member of the vboxusers group?

1) Version 6.0, directly off of https://www.virtualbox.org/, using the deb file (https://download.virtualbox.org/virtual ... _amd64.deb)

I got it from the virtualbox site because the Mint repository is way behind, offering version 5.2.18-dfsg-2~ubuntu18.04.1
Should I install the older version from the Mint repository instead?

2) I installed the Guest Additions, if that's what you're referring to. I installed VBoxGuestAdditions_6.0.0_RC1.iso. I did not get it from the Mint repository.

3) I am not a member of the vboxusers group.

Crossover is not free, but think there is a 14 day free trial. For me it was worth the money ($39?).

I'd be more than happy to spend the $39 for Crossover if it works as it claims to.

Also, how do you go about installing a Windows program so Crossover can use it?

One last thing is that I installed Office 2007 (I know, it's old, but it does everything I need it to do). Would there be any benefit to installing Office 2013? (Not in terms of features, but in the hopes that it may run better under VirtualBox.)

[AndyMH]

Version 6.0 is fine, it's what I'm using. VB is one of the few applications where the recommendation is to get it direct from oracle and not use the version in the repos.

Download and install the extension pack https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads. To install just double click on the file, if it doesn't automatically start VB tell it to open with virtualbox. Can't remember offhand exactly what it does, but will/may help your drag-n-drop problem. Next add yourself to the vboxusers group. Menu > admin > users & groups. Click on yourself and then click on the list of groups bottom right to bring up the list where you can check vboxusers.

Workspace 1_024.png

With that you will have the complete package VB + extn pack + guest additions + vboxusers group. Among other things, you will now have access to USB drives/devices inside win7.

I see no benefit to getting office 2013 (and probably difficult to get hold off now) if you are happy with 2007. I only moved because there were additional features in VBA in excel that I was using, and they changed the look slightly - compatibility with what I was using on my company laptop.

If you stick with 2007 then you can run it under wine, that's how I was originally using it. Wine is free and in the repos, so install from there. I had a few problems getting it to work under mint 18.3 and had to install a 32 bit prefix. My notes at the time below. This was maybe a couple of years ago and things may have moved on with wine, winetricks and playonlinux - others can comment on that as appropriate.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wine Desktop Files & Icons
11. Wine does not keep its desktop files in usr/share/applications but in /home/andy/.local/share/applications/wine/Programs/.
12. Wine icons are kept in /home/andy/.local/share/icons/.
Office 2007 Setup
13. Install wine from software manager. If Office 2007 is installed with either winetricks or playonlinux or directly from wine it will not work. This is because wine gets something wrong with office (32 bit app) in a 64 bit mint installation. Instead from a terminal enter:

Code: Select all

WINARCH=win32 WINPREFIX=~/.win32 winecfg

This creates a hidden folder win32 (prefix) in /home/andy. It also couldn’t find wine mono or gecko and installed these automatically. Funny, checking in the software manager after the event wine mono and gecko are showing not installed (maybe this is a 32bit to 64bit issue?).

Output from the above generated a number of errors as below, but didn’t affect the final outcome:

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andy@T430 ~ $ WINEARCH=win32 WINEPREFIX=~/.win32 winecfg
wine: created the configuration directory '/home/andy/.win32'
fixme:urlmon:DownloadBSC_OnProgress Unsupported status 3
fixme:wininet:InternetLockRequestFile STUB
fixme:storage:create_storagefile Storage share mode not implemented.
err:mscoree:LoadLibraryShim error reading registry key for installroot
err:mscoree:LoadLibraryShim error reading registry key for installroot
err:mscoree:LoadLibraryShim error reading registry key for installroot
err:mscoree:LoadLibraryShim error reading registry key for installroot
fixme:urlmon:DownloadBSC_OnProgress Unsupported status 3
fixme:wininet:InternetLockRequestFile STUB
fixme:storage:create_storagefile Storage share mode not implemented.
err:winediag:SECUR32_initNTLMSP ntlm_auth was not found or is outdated. Make sure that ntlm_auth>= 3.0.25 is in your path. Usually, you can find it in the winbind package of your distribution.
fixme:iphlpapi:NotifyAddrChange (Handle 0x11fe8a0, overlapped 0x11fe8ac): stub
wine: configuration in '/home/andy/.win32' has been updated.

Note – winbind was not installed, don’t know if its installation would have made any difference. Installed after the event just in case.

14. To install office, in a terminal:

Code: Select all

WINEPREFIX=~/.win32 wine control

This will bring up a window:

Use Add/Remove Programs to get at the setup.exe for office 2007.

NOTE – don’t think that powerpoint works under wine so only Word and Excel installed and none of the ‘add-ons’. Note need add-ons for spelling.

15. Running Excel for the first time caused the machine to hang and the only way out of it was a reboot. Second time around started Word first, it went to the give me your details and then validate on-line. It all worked. Fired up Excel and that worked as well.
16. Setup the defaults required for both, importantly pointing their default save to /home/andy/Data.
17. Problem found with word in that its recent list was not pointing at valid file locations. Word options/advanced to set recent documents to zero, restart, then set recent documents to whatever number is required, e.g. 20.
18. In addition to Excel and Word, Office tools and Office shared features also installed – without one or other of these you don’t get a spell checker.
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I think there was some other tweak I had to do with wine (think it was one of the ddls that sorted out a problem with charts in excel), but I would have to do more digging to find.

The advantage of wine, of course, is that it is free. Crossover is just wine underneath, but with a lot more effort from the people at Crossover to make more things work and take the pain out of installation. I think Crossover are the wine project's major source of funding.

If you do go down the Crossover route, software installation is easy - you just click on the "install windows software" button then type in the name of the program you want to install - Crossover will suggest what it is as you type. Crossover then does the rest - easy (as long as it works).

Workspace 1_024.png

[Moonraker]

Thank you- I'll give these a try and let you know what happens.

[Moonraker]

I installed the addons and also added myself to the vboxusers group.

It did seem to give me access to shared folders and they persist (marked as auto-mount and make permanent). So that works.

However, USB devices still are a no-go. At one time it had the Devices -> USB Settings dialogue box active and the "Enable USB Controller" checkbox was active with a check in it, but it still couldn't find any USB drives. Now when I go to that screen it has disabled everything including the "Enable USB Controller" checkbox.

Shared clipboard won't work, drag and drop works once in a while, maybe 5% of the time.

So I don't know what to think; maybe it's time to try Crossover and see what happens. If it works it would be worth the $39.

[AndyMH]

If you are running win in full screen you should have the VB menu bar along the bottom of the screen, right click on the usb icon and it will bring up a list of usb devices, check the one(s) you want access to. Note, in the screenshot I don't have any usb drives plugged in.

Workspace 1_026.png

[Moonraker]

Left-clicking on the USB control it doesn't do anything, right-clicking brings up a small menu that says "No USB devices connected" along with a "USB Settings" choice. Going to USB settings gives me a screen where everything is disabled (see attached pic). I did have a USB drive plugged in (which is recognized by Mint).

USB-setttings.png

If you are running win in full screen you should have the VB menu bar along the bottom of the screen, right click on the usb icon and it will bring up a list of usb devices, check the one(s) you want access to. Note, in the screenshot I don't have any usb drives plugged in.
Workspace 1_026.png

[AndyMH]

Looking back through your previous post, I don't think you have installed the extension pack, it is not the same as guest-additions. Download and install it.

Screenshot from 2019-01-21 18-57-30.png

[Moonraker]

Looking back through your previous post, I don't think you have installed the extension pack,

I did install it before. When I go to that link and click to open the file, Virtualbox tells me that it's already installed and asks if I want to install it again.

What's puzzling me is that the USB dialogue screen has been enabled before but now it's all greyed out. I can plug stuff in and it doesn't see notice change (but Mint does).

[AndyMH]

So next check, you have installed guest-additions inside windows?

Workspace 1_027.png

[Moonraker]

So next check, you have installed guest-additions inside windows?

It looks like they're in there:

[AndyMH]

It should be working - you have the extension pack, have installed guest-additions and are a member of vboxusers group. That is everything you need on the linux side.

Note - you can check that the extension pack is installed from the virtualbox manager: file > preferences > extensions.

Screenshot from 2019-01-22 09-59-33.png

Or in a terminal, VBoxManage list extpacks, gives slightly more info, this is what mine looks like:

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andy@T430 ~ $ VBoxManage list extpacks
Extension Packs: 1
Pack no. 0:   Oracle VM VirtualBox Extension Pack
Version:      6.0.2
Revision:     128162
Edition:      
Description:  USB 2.0 and USB 3.0 Host Controller, Host Webcam, VirtualBox RDP, PXE ROM, Disk Encryption, NVMe.
VRDE Module:  VBoxVRDP
Usable:       true 
Why unusable: 
andy@T430 ~ $ 

The only thing I can think of now is look at the device manager (control panel > system > device manager) in windows to see if there are missing drivers. As released, win7 did not provide support for USB3.0 and that might be the problem. You have to download and install the drivers.

https://downloadcenter.intel.com/downlo ... -NUC6i7KYK

The easiest thing to do here is copy the download into one of your shared folders, then in win copy it somewhere onto drive C: and run it from there! If you try and install (run an .exe) from the shared folder win will probably complain and refuse to run. I can tell you how to fix this, but not at the moment.

Once you have the USB3 drivers installed in win, in virtualbox (for this you must not have win running - the reason all your options were greyed out in your previous post was because you had win running), goto settings > usb and you can select USB3.0.

Screenshot from 2019-01-22 10-16-05.png

And try accessing a USB drive again (I'm assuming formatted FAT, win won't read ext4 format). Fingers crossed!

[Moonraker]

I downloaded the file at https://downloadcenter.intel.com/downlo ... -NUC6i7KYK

When running the setup file, I get a message stating that the PC doesn't meet the minimum hardware requirements, which is weird because it's a fairly recent box (a couple years old) and it's definitely got USB ports.

When I go into the USB settings (with Win7 not running I do see them enabled, as seen in the image attached. But when all is said and done, I still can't see any USB devices in the running VM and it doesn't detect anything when I plug a device in.

[AndyMH]

Think I pointed you at the wrong USB3 drivers, try this:
https://downloadcenter.intel.com/downlo ... set-Family

or, on the same page is a link to the intel driver and support assistant - might be better to download that and install (in win7) and let it tell you what is needed.

When I did this, I 'cheated' and downloaded 'driver easy' and let it find my missing win7 drivers. Didn't point you at this as it is commercial software (the free version lets you only install one driver at a time).

You didn't say if you had checked in the windows device manager to see if any drivers were missing?