Adobe Software on Linux?

RWBRWB Icrontian
edited December 2004 in Science & Tech
Ever since I started college I have been playing games less and less, now I haven't played a game in a month. Except Consoles.

So I am curious if you can run Photoshop and other software packages like it on Linux? Or would it be a waist since I do have Windows2K already.
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Comments

  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited October 2003
    Two words:

    I wish



    I've been putting off switching to linux due solely to this reason. The only adobe apps that run natively on linux are FrameMaker and Acrobat Reader ..... pfff
  • kanezfankanezfan sunny south florida Icrontian
    edited October 2003
    you might be able to run PS through WINE, not sure about it. there's also the Gimp, which is a photoshop like app, some say just as good in fact.
  • KwitkoKwitko Sheriff of Banning (Retired) By the thing near the stuff Icrontian
    edited October 2003
    I've heard of a lot of problems with PS in Wine. PS, and to a lesser extent, Flash are the 2 things keeping me from switching to Linux as my web development platform. Oh, that and the fact that I suck as a web designer.
  • RWBRWB Icrontian
    edited October 2003
    Yeah, I don't want to EMULATE, that slows it down and then it would be fairly worthless to do.

    But at the same time, I want to LEARN linux, and the only way for me to do that is have a good desire to actually use Linux. I WANT to use it, but I just can't find reasons to switch to it.

    I am just getting bored of Windows.
  • a2jfreaka2jfreak Houston, TX Member
    edited October 2003
    You can use The GIMP on Linux, but be ye forewarnerd: The GIMP is *NOT* NOT NOT NOT (I cannot emphasize this enough) Photoshop. PS is absolutely, hands-down, bar-none, the cream of the crop!
  • RWBRWB Icrontian
    edited October 2003
    This is true, and why i won't ever use it, at least not while I am in school. We use Photoshop and other Adobe things for good reasons(like they get it for free). While I am in school, I will not be using other things just becuase.

    Like IF they had a course on MS Office, I would use MS Office and not OpenOffice. But once I get in the real world, I will use whatever I want ;)

    I am gonna see if I can ask my Lecturer tomorrow about why the hell they can't make it for Linux, but they can for MAC. He talks with Adobe people all the damned time.
  • Straight_ManStraight_Man Geeky, in my own way Naples, FL Icrontian
    edited October 2003
    Waste-- most Adobe software is coded for large volume use, and depends on having the ability to have its own built-in memory management with Widnows support. Emulators cannot hack this right now-- the ones that are fast rely on Linux memory management and the one that is not so fast sets up a virtual VM session based on QEMM technology and that does not support the more advanced memory mgt needs of Photoshop-- limit of that Virtual VM is 128 MB for all of Windows and result is that Photshop is Memory strapped for complex work. Paint Shop Pro 8 is, also.

    The only answer to this is VMWare, and it costs and you would need a 1 GIG or bigger RAM based machine with an Enterprise kernel adn then host what you already have within it to get Photoshop running. Adobe would be dumber than snot to release their code to open source, and that is how Linux works-- base code must be open source, though the proprietory stuff would still be licensable if they chose to do that adn release say Photoshop Elements as an Open Soruce core and sell plugins.

    If they have an OS X Jaguar or later version that is stable, that is a BSD core OS but memory management might be slightly non-BSD becasue of how MACs work. The G5's are not yet supported by Linux's PowerPC subversion, but that would be the best try to start with-- make a MAC subversion of Linux or BSD map large RAM blocks to lower priority apps of digital graphics sort-- BSD could eventually be extended to do this in part.

    Sun StarOffice 7.0 and OpenOffice in latest final flavor and in betas however CAN gen valid pdf files readable by Windows acrobat reader programs and Linux Acrobat Reader (I run 5.0.5 with search in Linux, and it is a Linux subversion of Adobe Acrobat Reader and this might signal an exploring of interest on Adobe's part.) One core problem right now is that many modern cameras that produce digitial photos big enough to need Adobe memory management support are not fully supported by Linux or use EXIM which most Linux apps grok not much at all right now.

    OTOH, GIMP does have fuscripts to add functions to it and these are available for relatively small fees from the scripting authors and act in a vein similar to plugins for Photoshop and Paint Shop Pro. Basicly, the CORE of GIMPs expansibility is that it supports plugin-like fuscripting and you can batch fuscripts as they are scripts and can be chained by calling them from an uberscript or merged, or functions cut-n-pasted into new fuscripts for your own use.

    Cliff's notes: Core obstacle is insufficient memory management size chunks for an individual core thread with many hungry subthreads-- Linux likes more modular threading for the most part. Underlying VMM is not BSD-like enough right now to be able to chunk huge RAM chunks to direct control of an app, and neither BSD nor Linux like hugely branching thread TREES from a single base app well enough yet.

    John.
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited October 2003
    so in other words,

    no.

    ;D
  • RWBRWB Icrontian
    edited October 2003
    Man, I had flashbacks of Matrix Reloaded with Ageek speaking... I felt like his next words were going to be VisaVi' or Concordiantly, maybe even Aur'gou or however you spell those damned words no one uses. lol
  • profdlpprofdlp The Holy City Of Westlake, Ohio
    edited October 2003
    primesuspect had this to say
    so in other words,

    no.

    ;D
    Actually, that would be in other word! :vimp:
  • a2jfreaka2jfreak Houston, TX Member
    edited October 2003
    profdlp had this to say
    primesuspect had this to say
    so in other words,

    no.

    ;D
    Actually, that would be in other word! :vimp:

    Actually that would be In a word.
  • profdlpprofdlp The Holy City Of Westlake, Ohio
    edited October 2003
    a2jfreak had this to say
    profdlp had this to say
    primesuspect had this to say
    so in other words,

    no.

    ;D
    Actually, that would be in other word! :vimp:

    Actually that would be In a word.
    There's only room for one wise-ass in this thread - and that's me.

    Got it, Sonny?

    :p

    ...daggone little skunk had to be right, too... :rolleyes2
  • a2jfreaka2jfreak Houston, TX Member
    edited October 2003
    Aye, aye, Professor.
  • profdlpprofdlp The Holy City Of Westlake, Ohio
    edited October 2003
    You know I'm kidding, right?

    :respect::wave:
  • qparadoxqparadox Vancouver, BC
    edited October 2003
    RWB, dunno if someone suggested this to you, but if you wanna learn linux buy cheap Linksys KVM and throw together an old comp with ~500 Mhz proc, 256 MB of ram and a 10-15GB HD. (Lower specs would be fine, but this is a good area to aim) Find a distro you like and just try stuff. If you want to setup a webserver, well go find the apache documents, download the packages and do it :D. I wouldn't recommend trying to switch platforms during a school year, that's just asking for trouble. But definitely try it, if you don't mind mucking around reading some documentation you should be set. I think most computer literate people could figure out Linux pretty easily if they just took a few hours and go into it thinking "its not windows, it something new that i'm going to have to learn and i'm going to have to tough it out sometimes." Be sure to have an IRC client installed on your windows machine as you can get tons of free linux help on hundreds of different irc channels and servers.

    Ageek: I thought there was a free non-commercial tree of VMWARE available under debian, maybe I'm wrong though, its been at least a year since i've touched VMWARE.
  • RWBRWB Icrontian
    edited October 2003
    Did you just say "buy"? Sorry no. I can't even buy food.
  • SlickSlick Upstate New York
    edited October 2003
    Do a dual boot then?
  • RWBRWB Icrontian
    edited October 2003
    Again, I would have no reason to use the Linux install.

    I would rather have ONE OS so that my folding production doesn't go down, and also so I wouldn't reboot.

    But then again, I may try to do a dual boot later on... after I have gotten some time so I can play with gimp some. But that is a big maybe.
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited October 2003
    "Ergo, no."
  • SlickSlick Upstate New York
    edited October 2003
    Well it really just depends on if you want to play with it or not. I don't think any reason is just going to spring out at you unless you get some job that requires linux knowledge. You sound like you want to play with it but cant really find a reason. Your reason is curiosity my friend, just go for it.
  • flamingpeachflamingpeach Ontario, Canadia
    edited November 2003
    You can run photoshop on linux using crossover office .
    CrossOver Office allows you to install your favorite Windows productivity applications in Linux, without needing a Microsoft Operating System license. CrossOver includes an easy to use, single click interface, which makes installing a Windows application simple and fast.

    Once installed, your application will integrate directly with your Gnome or KDE environment. Just click and run your application, exactly as you would in Windows, but with the full freedom of Linux.

    Similar to wine, but tested specifially for products like microsoft office, and adobe photoshop.


    :)
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited November 2003
    which means slow. Sorry, emulation doesn't cut it for me.. I need native code...
  • RWBRWB Icrontian
    edited November 2003
    Plus it doesn't mention After Effects, Illustrator, and others.
  • flamingpeachflamingpeach Ontario, Canadia
    edited November 2003
    RWB had this to say
    Plus it doesn't mention After Effects, Illustrator, and others.

    I use Adobe After Effects, Adobe illustrator, Adobe Image Ready and Adobe Reader, all under that application.

    There are no bottle necks, and no noticable speed reductions what so ever.

    I have also used mIRC, Outlook express, Microsoft Office and Microsoft Internet Explorer under crossover office for testing reasons.

    I prefer corssover office far more then wine, as it is alot faster.


    You were asking if it was possible to use asobe photoshop under linux, and my answer is yes, with this program.
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited November 2003
    Okay, tell me how well linux supports firewire and direct DV capture using premiere with crossover office. Tell me how font support works. Tell me about postscript printer drivers. Does the photoshop dual processor plugin work? What about 3rd party filter support?

    I'm not trying to diss you, but what we need is NATIVE support - not emulation. It may emulate 99% but it will never be 100%... And if you need to get real work done and you rely on your systems as a source of livelihood, then you cannot risk your business on emulation.
  • flamingpeachflamingpeach Ontario, Canadia
    edited November 2003
    primesuspect had this to say

    I'm not trying to diss you, but what we need is NATIVE support - not emulation. It may emulate 99% but it will never be 100%... And if you need to get real work done and you rely on your systems as a source of livelihood, then you cannot risk your business on emulation.


    The question RWB was asking is if he could run the program on linux, I simply told him he could.


    If you want native support why use photoshop at all?

    GIMP gets the job done.

    :rolleyes:
  • VulpinusVulpinus
    edited November 2003
    primesuspect had this to say


    I'm not trying to diss you, but what we need is NATIVE support - not emulation. It may emulate 99% but it will never be 100%... And if you need to get real work done and you rely on your systems as a source of livelihood, then you cannot risk your business on emulation.


    There is absolutely zero debate as to whether pshop for linux exists. If you refuse to accept the next best solution and dismiss it out of hand simply because it's a dreaded emulator solution, that's your prerogative. Unless you have actually tested this and can honestly say it is unusable, then you should be asking these questions and not starting a derailing argument with someone who did nothing but answer the question.
  • Straight_ManStraight_Man Geeky, in my own way Naples, FL Icrontian
    edited November 2003
    Ok, there are two problems with the structures of Adobe software versus Linux. Adobe, from day one, coded its software to handle memory internal to the app. That means they did things Windows normally would do with direct memory writes. Windows was coded to allow for this and to let the apps work. Adobe likes 2-3X the file size it is working on for a buffer. The only thing I KNOW works is VMware hosted on Linux with 98 SE running in VMware as only VMware can address a big enough emulation buffer for this kind of memory management strategy as a percentage of total RAM.

    Now, if there were a good MAC OS X Jaguar emulator for Linux, tha might also be doable for the apps that Adobe is porting to Jaguar.

    However, Win4Lin has an upper RAM to Windows client limit of 128 MB, which would limit you to 16 meg files to work on max if resources were about 30% used (70%) free to begin with and if you literally could live with a 1\4 speed to a 1\5th speed emulation because of how Win4lLin handles RAM. So, you have than Win4Lin plus work area for app using OVER 250 MB. Linux likes to use all RAM, with 1 GIG of RAM I got 1\4-15th speed emulation out of Adobe Photoshop Elements and Photoshop would not install much less run. with Wine, Elements would not install EITHER, nor would any graphic app that wanted more than 2X file size in work buffers. More undo means more active copies of file size multiplier grabbed for work buffer in a graphics app. GIMP works in Linux only because it is made of tiny bricks or program parts, thus many threads that are individually controllable. Other than Plugins, this is not so for Photoshop-- the thread strategies and work buffer grab limits conflict. Adobe would have to radically rewrite Photoshop to make it Linux compliant to any great degree, and OX X Jaguar does more as Widnows does than as Linux does so they are porting there first. Second, Linux is graphic support weaker for Radeon cards than for nVidia, adn IIRC Photoshop more favors Radeon or Quadro cards as compared to the other nVidia cards, so graphic support in Linux is skewed the wrong way for Photoshop also. This is why I have a Radeon+Windows 98 SE Barton box that does 90% of my graphics work and all of my Business Accounting and time keeping and appointment work and the P4+nVidia GF2 box surfs 90% and gets email 100%. I use Opera 7.21 when I get sites that do not like Mozilla.

    John.
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited November 2003
    I have actually tested it, and it is actually unusable. Read all the points I brought up.
  • compu-geee-whizcompu-geee-whiz Guatemala
    edited December 2004
    Ya. I like GIMP its not as good as PS but for the minor things i want to use, it works pretty good.
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