Hi, I need to run Photoshop7 and Internet Explorer (preferably 6) in Linux due to the nature of my work (web design and programming).

As I've been browsing forums here and @ gentoo.org I discovered there are 2 possible ways to do this, with crossover office and with Wine. I'd like to know which one is "better"... I mean easier to handle, more stable etc... some positive and negative sides of both choices would be nice...

And what exactly it is this two are and what they do (can't figure out how can they run ms progs...)?

laters, ilh

WINE (WINE Is Not an Emulator) is the daddy of Crossover Office. Have a look at winehq.org for an explanation of it. WINE is free to download and install, whereas Crossover Office costs around $40 - $50 I believe.

I have used both and have Crossover to be "better", but that is just me.

Those two I would not use for any kind of development even if one them are commercial program. I would use them for games because they are still in beta. I have used WINE but it is very unstable. I think Crossover is little stable though have not tried it. I suggest using VMware for any development work because it is very stable.

I use Crossover v2.1. It is easy to install crossover itself, using their installer or an RPM package. It also is easy to install programs, and I find it works very well. Installed applications are placed in a "Windows Applications" Sub-Menu on the KDE / Gnome main menu.

Internet Explorer works well, and I think Photoshop is supported, however check the list on their website.

Hope this helps,
from Ian

I was checking out the suprnova.org page and it seems that the 2.0.0 version is cca 30mb and the 2.1.0 is like 10mb... why is that? Isn't supposed to be the newer version bigger (more stuff etc). Is there sth wrong with this 2.1.0 version?

Not necessarily, the newer version may be more tightly coded, call on more things from the distro as oppposed to the old one, may even have superfluous things removed.

Check the changelogs, if they are available.