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Adobe Dreamweaver CS6:

Rating: Silver
Release(s) Tested: Adobe Master Collection CS6
Application Version: N/A
WINE/Proton Version: WINE 8.0.1
Test Scope: adding/removing sites, synchronizing over FTP, local site browsing, code hints, user settings, editing HTML, CSS, PHP, and JavaScript files
Input Method: Keyboard & Mouse
Launch Options:
Date of Report: 16 June 2023

Summary

Works well overall, but opening files and changing tabs are both slow, and the application occasionally locks up.

Installing & Running

1. Installing Adobe Master Collection CS6

If you previously installed Adobe Master Collection CS6 by following another one of my reports, you can skip to step #2.

Make sure that winbind is installed via the following (the installer will not work without this dependency; if you forget to install it, you may need to delete your WINE prefix and start again from scratch):

apt-get install winbind

To install Adobe Master Collection CS6, I recommend creating a dedicated WINE prefix, and then installing all Adobe applications into it. In my case, the prefix is located in the following directory, but you can create a folder wherever you want:

$HOME/applications/__wine/adobe/

After you have created this folder, run the following command to install the needed dependencies:

WINEPREFIX=~/applications/__wine/adobe winetricks atmlib gdiplus msxml3 msxml6 vcrun2005 vcrun2005sp1 vcrun2008 fontsmooth=rgb

You can now run the installer via the following:

WINEPREFIX=~/applications/__wine/adobe wine /path/to/installer.exe

Follow the regular installation steps. You should install all applications to their default C: directories; this will place them in the WINE prefix you just created.

The installer may report that some applications did not correctly install. You can ignore this message; some applications will work regardless, and others (like Premiere) are unusable on Linux anyways.

2. Running Dreamweaver CS6

You can run Dreamweaver via the following command:

WINEPREFIX=~/applications/__wine/adobe wine ~/applications/__wine/adobe/drive_c/Program Files (x86)/Adobe Dreamweaver CS6/Dreamweaver.exe

You can also create a .desktop file with the following command, adjusting paths as needed:

/usr/bin/env sh -c "winepath -w -0 \"%F\" | WINEPREFIX='$HOME/applications/__wine/adobe' xargs -0 wine 'C:\\\\Program Files (x86)\\\\Adobe Dreamweaver CS6\\\\Dreamweaver.exe'"

The latter command will allow you to right-click on files and open them in Dreamweaver. This command will also allow you to associate specific file types e.g. .php with Dreamweaver, enabling double-click support in your file browser.

Results & Issues

The loading splash screen for Dreamweaver sometimes was sometimes entirely black, or had various graphical artifacts. This did not affect usage of the application.

Most features worked the same as in Windows. I was able to add this very site (and several others) within Dreamweaver, connect to it, and synchronize my files. The application correctly recognized newer/existing files when synchronizing. Site browsing worked the same as on Windows.

The Split and Design view modes worked as expected, allowing me to preview my sites in the same manner (and with the same limitations) as on Windows.

Editing of HTML, PHP, CSS, and JavaScript files was virtually the same as on Windows. I was able to successfully change my user preferences in this regard—syntax coloring, indent amounts, auto-tag closing, etc.

Autocompletion did not work nearly as well. Although the pop-up behavior was correct, sometimes the pop-up window itself showed only a black rectangle. This artifact was usually resolved by moving the keyboard cursor away (to cancel the suggestions) and then moving it back. Depending on use-case, this behavior may be a dealbreaker for some.

File loading was slow; sometimes 1-2 seconds each. I was able to load multiple files at a time from my file browser, but Dreamweaver occasionally crashed if I selected too many. When opening the same number of files manually, I did not observe any crashing.

Tab switching was similarly slow, forcing a redraw of the entire Dreamweaver screen. This behavior made it difficult to quickly compare tab contents. As a result, it was nearly impossible to visually inspect two files for differences.

The application froze randomly when left idle e.g. when I was browsing a published site on Firefox. These freezes were very rare and could not be reproduced. Given this behavior, I recommend saving all files when leaving the application unattended for more than 5 minutes.

Notes

All Linux reports on this site were created using Dreamweaver CS6 on Linux!