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Win4Lin (Run Windows Apps under Linux)

By Nicholas Petreley

Summary
Win4Lin runs Windows as an application under Linux, often without significant performance problems. This week, Nick writes about his experience with the software and shares some practical advice on making it work efficiently. (1,200 words)

I'm enjoying the recent media madness over the presidential election; it has been a real learning experience. For example, I've learned that I should be able to get just about anything I want by claiming to be "disenfranchised." Last night when my wife served meat loaf, I complained that I would have requested something else, but her dinner choices were too confusing. If she didn't want me to feel disenfranchised, she would have to make a whole new dinner. It didn't work, but I can't get the major news networks to breathe down her neck with claims of illegal menus. 

In the unlikely event that you're an all-Linux shop, Windows fans in your organization may feel a little disenfranchised. In the more likely event that you're an all-Windows shop, Linux users are almost certainly disenfranchised. 

Here's one way to enfranchise both groups: get a copy of NeTraverse Win4Lin 2.0. (Win4Lin 2.0 is currently in beta. See Resources for more details.) Win4Lin allows you to install Windows 95 or Windows 98 as an application that runs on Linux. When you start up Windows, it appears in a window on your desktop; you can then install and run almost any Windows application. (You can't run most games because Win4Lin doesn't support DirectX.) 

I installed the Win4Lin 2.0 beta and Windows 98SE under Caldera eDesktop 2.4 and Debian 2.2. I used the Windows display settings to resize the Windows desktop to 1576x1087, which fits nicely in my 1600x1200 KDE2 desktop. Then I installed Microsoft Office 2000 and Netscape Navigator 4.76. I tried every application that would make a Windows user feel enfranchised under Linux: Outlook, Excel, Word, PowerPoint, Internet Explorer, and Access. So far, they all work perfectly. 

The performance is downright amazing. At first, I experienced minor performance problems with XFree86 set to a color depth of 24. I changed the color depth to 16 bits and allocated 48 MB of RAM to Win4Lin and Windows 98. (The default is 24 MB.) With those settings, both KDE2 and Win4Lin really scream on my 600-MHz P3 system. I can simultaneously use Word, PowerPoint, Excel, Outlook, Internet Explorer, and listen to a RealPlayer audio stream under Windows with no problems. And even with the entire suite running, Win4Lin has no perceptible impact on the performance of any of my Linux applications. 

Installing Win4Lin can be a little tricky, depending on your Linux distribution and hardware. If you use the default kernel for most Linux distributions, the Win4Lin installation program will patch the kernel binary. I customize every kernel I use, so that wouldn't work for me. Fortunately, NeTraverse provides patches for various kernel source code trees. I patched my kernel and had the Win4Lin-enabled kernel up and running in about a half-hour. 

The rest of the installation was quite straightforward. Win4Lin copies your Windows CD to the hard drive; you install Windows 98 fresh from there. One thing caught me by surprise: the process required a Windows boot floppy. 

One of the most wonderful things about Win4Lin is its fast simulation of a system reboot. That speed made the normally excruciating task of installing Windows and Windows software almost pleasant. Normally, you have to sit through numerous slow system reboots. Win4Lin, however, took a maximum of about 30 seconds for each reboot -- frequently much less. And when it did take more time than I expected, I simply switched to another Linux program and did some work while I waited. 

Win4Lin's limitations

Windows 98SE under Win4Lin has some limitations. As I mentioned above, it doesn't do DirectX, so applications that depend on DirectX won't run. Most of those applications are games, so that won't be a problem for most people. If I want to run Windows games, I'll boot directly into Windows for the best possible performance. 

While your TCP/IP-based Internet applications will work fine, Windows networking won't. That means you can't use Windows printers, use the network neighborhood, or map network drives -- at least, not like you usually do from Windows. 

You can, however, use Linux to mount network resources and assign them to drives for use by Windows. For example, I store all of my documents on my file server. I then mount the document directory at the client using NFS, and assign that directory to appear as drive E under Win4Lin. Since you can also mount drives in Linux using Samba (which is basically Windows networking), you can usually duplicate the drive mapping that you normally have in Windows by fiddling with Linux. 

Win4Lin also has a tricky way of making just about any Linux printer -- including remote printers -- appear as a special hardware port to Windows. When you set up a printer under Windows, you simply choose that port instead of, say, the default parallel port. 

Win4Lin expects you to use a Windows print definition, such as one for the LaserJet 6MP. That means you must create a definition for your Unix printer that doesn't use any Unix print filters. I could have done that easily a few days earlier, but I had just started experimenting with the new Common Unix Printing System (CUPS). I haven't figured out how to create a printer definition in CUPS that doesn't use a print filter. So I switched back to the old Unix lpr system, defined a printer without a filter, and got everything working. Now Windows under Win4Lin prints to my network printer perfectly. 

If you're using XFree86 4.0.1, you should make a slight modification to your XF86Config-4 file to avoid a nasty Windows-related problem. Find the section in which you define your video device, and add the following line: 

Option "BackingStore" 
 

Without that option, the Windows desktop will go black if you switch desktops, and portions of your Windows desktop will disappear if you create overlapping Linux windows. I also had a few minor display problems running Win4Lin with XFree86 3.3.6. My technical support contact is looking into the problem. I'll let you know what I find out, but I'm in no rush to solve it; I prefer XFree86 4.0.1 anyway. 

Finally, I'm certain many of you will wonder how Win4Lin stacks up against the most popular way to run Windows and Linux simultaneously - VMware. (See Resources for a link.) Unfortunately, I haven't used VMware enough to make a fair comparison. The only thing I am sure of is that VMware is much more expensive, at a whopping $299 for commercial use ($99 for students and hobbyists). 

By comparison, Win4Lin is very reasonably priced: $59 for the download, $89 if you want the CD-ROM and a manual. It is possible that Win4Lin doesn't do as much as VMware, but I can't say. If you can't wait for me to write a column on VMware, you can download a free trial version of both products and compare them. Neither trial version comes crippled, but both expire after a time limit. The Win4Lin trial period is 75 days. 

If you are a Windows user who really wants to migrate to Linux, but you think you'll feel disenfranchised without your Windows productivity applications, Win4Lin is a must-have. If, on the other hand, you want to run Linux without breaking company rules about which Windows applications you must use for work, then Win4Lin is an absolute necessity.

Resources