[Gllug] Forward of moderated message

[Avi Greenbury]

general_email at technicalbloke.com wrote:

> On 27/08/11 02:21, Avi Greenbury wrote:
> >
> >> I run Photoshop regularly in Wine and it runs very well. I also run
> >> Flash CS4 in an XP VM I made from an image of a defunct XP box so
> >> the cost of an XP license is moot also - who can't get their hands
> >> on an old XP box when they need one? Many of these so-and-so isn't
> >> available for linux arguments are actually nonsense.
> > Very few people would regard "can be run in a Windows VM atop the
> > OS of your choice" as the software being available for that OS.
> 
> Well that's their problem! VM's are supported by all modern hardware
> so they're not even slow any more and most VMs can do "seamless mode"
> or an equivalent so it's barely any different from running a native
> app.

But you've still got to find a copy of whatever OS it is that you need
and install and configure it. The last time I faffed with a
seamless-mode, it was only aesthetically seamless. I/O and network was
still (predictably) through a very much visible VM.

> Many of the Adobe creative suite apps run OK under Wine too, so they
> are as good as "native". 

I'd suggest that running through Wine is a lot closer to 'native' than
through a VM, but still not really native. Despite it's name, in
purpose WINE is effectively an emulator.


> > Why? OSX86 can be run in VirtualBox, which fits your
> > Photoshop-supported-on-linux point above. I'd find it a damn sight
> > easier to get hold of an old mac (even a wintel one) than I would a
> > spare XP machine.
> >
> 
> 
> Well it's not strictly legal for one and Apple haven't exactly been
> friendly towards the hackintosh community in the past so I wouldn't be
> surprised if, every now and then, some rug-pulling update they release
> arbitrarily borks everyones VM based system. For all we knock
> Microsoft at least they aren't hostile to VM's - as long as you're
> licensed they don't give a damn - probably because they don't sell PC
> hardware.

You're not allowed to run an OEM Windows license on any machine other
than the one it was purchased with, and MS have also been distinctly
suspicious of VMs, too.

I've had Windows VMs break through their remote breakage of 'pirated'
installs before. Perhaps it happens less so now - I'm not sure they're
too bothered about XP piracy since they've all but stopped selling it.

> The same can't be said for Apple - don't they still explicitly forbid
> installing OSX on anything other than Apple hardware in their
> shrinkwrap? If so I suppose you could legally run OSX in virtual box
> under linux as long as you were running that instance of linux on Mac
> hardware but bleh!

Yeah, much like the Windows EULA, though I think both demand that they
be run on the metal, not as a guest OS.

-- 
Avi
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