WineHQ and Linux Mint

[b727plane]

I have installed WineHQ only my Linux Mint box and it works and works very well. My question is .. what makes wineHQ work so well under Linux Mint that it doesn't work well under other version of Linux. Under other versions, I have to update the system first and reboot (sometimes several times) while under Linux Mint I do not. Does it have to do with some proprietary software that Mint is running? If so, does anyone have any idea what packages those might be?

[Husse]

This is pure guess but as Mint comes with preinstalled codecs this may contribute, but I don't know how Wine works well enough to make a valid conclusion

[b727plane]

I wish I knew so that I could add the codecs to my other Linux installations. These are the things that would make using Linux more widespread if someone was paying attention to the details. I do not fault anyone because I use Linux 99 percent of the time now ... I just want to to be better or the best.

[T J Tulley]

I have just viewed WineHQ and the latest version offered is 0.9.60, released 18/4/08. The improvements described in recent versions are very attractive. Currently the latest in the Mint repository is 0.9.46 - I've just installed it.
Last October Scorp123 posted in this forum a note about using later updates than are in the repos - it would be helpful to have more advice about the risks involved. He mentioned "early" versions - Wine had still not reached 1.0 - is this still early and risky?
So far I haven't actually used Wine although I have tried - not very hard. I would be grateful for detailed advice about how to do it - perhaps this is written up somewhere?

[Husse]

Afaik, there's no risk in using Wine. Please, by all means, TRY to run viruses for windows under Wine. IT WONT WORK. AT ALL. :3

I do not agree entirely
This has been tried and there is a very lengthy and interesting topic in the Ubuntu forums about it (somewhere - and I don't intend to spend time looking it up)
It was actually possible to generate files in home for some virus, but it could not spread outside wine
But I fear you could get infected inside wine
Basically - you have to work hard for this

[b727plane]

I use wine for 2 (two) programs. Ypops and Hotpops2.11 both for retreiving my yahoo mail and hotmail through my Opera browser mail setup. Hotpops 2.11 was a free mail popper for retreiving your hotmail and for some reason it still works. The only program that I cannot get to work with wine is a program I purchased called Talking Buddy by amazing software see this link http://appdb.winehq.org/objectManager.p ... n&iId=4555 for a copy. Someone who reviewed it said it was spyware but I liked the program because it has a small wizard character which sat on my desktop and gave the time, weather, news updates, and and was great overall. It used IE (which I do not care for) and was Windows based (which is why I switched to Linux). Except for this one program, I am satified to use Linux forever with no hesitation of looking back on the troubles I had. I use Linux because it does not get in the way of my internet experience but I really would like for someone to get the talking buddy to work. I am not a programmer so I cannot begin to tell you what the errors are and what I have to do to correct them so that the program works.

[rhvkl]

@b727plane ... i think there is an easy way: using thunderbird + webmail addon ?
I'm using wine only for software I can't find alternatives (some games or special software) or for whereisit where I was too lazy to recatalog my database :)

/edit: sorry I've missunderstood your problem i think ... just ignore my comment.