How to install Wine 1.3 on Ubuntu

Wine is a free and open source software that allows programs written for Microsoft Windows to run on Linux and other Unix-like operating systems. In this mini-HOWTO, I will explain how to install Wine 1.3, the latest version at the time of writing, on Ubuntu 10.04. It probably works also for later versions of Wine and Ubuntu.

Add Wine's repository

To begin with, we need to add Ubuntu Wine Team's Personal package archives to the source list of the Advanced Packaging Tool (APT):

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntu-wine

Then update APT's package information by running:

sudo apt-get update

Install Wine

You are now ready to install Wine1.3:

sudo apt-get install wine1.3

It is worth nothing that winetricks is also installed. Winetricks is a script that provides an interface similar to apt-get to download and install various libraries sometimes needed.

Configure Wine

Before doing anything else, start Wine's configuration applet, and review its settings:

winecfg &

My experience is that all settings are good.

Use Wine

You are now ready to use Wine. To start a Windows program under Wine, just enter wine followed by the path in Windows to the application. Paths in Windows may contain backslashes (\) and spaces (␣). Since these has special meaning in Bash, they must be escaped. Thus, replace every \ with \\, and every ␣ with \␣.

To demonstrate, let us start Internet Explorer:

wine c:\\Program\\Internet\ Explorer\\iexplore.exe

As in Windows, it is allowed to leave out the .exe suffix. Hence, following will also start Internet Explorer:

wine c:\\Program\\Internet\ Explorer\\iexplore

Programs that are on Windows' path, e.g. Notepad, can be started without the full path. Notepad can thus be started by just typing:

wine notepad

Install programs in Wine

To install a Windows program under Wine, just run its installer as above.

To demonstrate, let us install Notepad++:

cd
wget http://download.tuxfamily.org/notepadplus/5.8.6/npp.5.8.6.Installer.exe
wine npp.5.8.6.Installer.exe

To run it, just enter:

wine c:\\Program\\Notepad++\\Notepad++

Uninstall program in Wine

To uninstall a Windows program under Wine, just run its uninstaller as above.

To demonstrate, let us uninstall Notepad++:

wine c:\\Program\\Notepad++\\uninstall