Joy of progeCAD 2009 under Wine in Debian Linux

At CADDIT we are always trying new things, sometimes just for the sheer fascination. This article outlines some updated steps to running progeCAD without buying a Windows license (although some free libraries will be needed). Understand that progeCAD is at this time not officially supported on Linux, either using Parallels or WINE emulation layer. So don't try this at home unless you are really brave and have lots of time to waste (not to mention progeCAD licenses).

We were able to accomplish several things following these steps: install progeCAD, activate progeCAD (online method), load a file, etc. Our test involved using a stand-alone license key (although NLM client might also work). progeCAD runs stable but slow (depending on your core(s) speed and OpenGL acceleration). Here we go:

1) Update to the latest WineHQ (1.1.x). Debian users can add the following line to /etc/apt/sources.list:
deb http://wine.budgetdedicated.com/apt etch main
2) apt-get install libwine wine wine-dev
okay you really don't need wine-dev development packages, but like isn't that the whole point of Linux .. whatever .. okay next step...
3) Install IE6. No joke. A platform like progeCAD often connects to a lot of the same dependencies as the world's most favorite web browser ..okay ..whatever.. we use ies4linux for this. Please visit the site for download directions specific to your favorite distro and get lovely IE6 and friends rocking in your local .wine profile.
4) Install VBA. This is possible now because ies4linux already set up DCOM libs for us. Winetricks is probably the best trick for this:
wget http://www.kegel.com/wine/winetricks
and run the ./winetricks GUI and pick what you want, but at least pick the VBA6 runtime. Winetricks should do the rest for you.
5) Install progeCAD. You can download progeCAD HERE.
6) progeCAD install seems to go well right up to the VBA installation at the end it flops (so far - we are working on it). But no matter, you can always reinstall Windows VBA for progeCAD IntelliCAD by sorting into your local subdirectory:
~/.wine/drive_c/Program\ Files/progeSOFT/progeCAD\ 2009\ Pro\ ENG/vba/
and installing VBA manually:
msiexec /i VBAOF11.MSI

WINE actually sets up a KDE icon on the desktop for you to launch progeCAD, we didn't try GNOME or XFCE. Otherwise you may have to create an action leading to the icad.exe executable in your .wine profile. So progeCAD should work now as so...


Some comments, progeCAD is a lot less demanding on system resources than AutoCAD, so it was actually possible for us to still work with progeCAD under this emulated environment. Real time pan and zoom function using the mouse buttons worked too but was so slow on the machine with on board graphics it could hardly be called real time anymore. The command interpreter disappeared once while minimizing / maximizing the progeCAD Window in KDE, but moving the window a bit around somehow brought it back again. Go figure..