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I'm not sure if this is the right place for such feedback, but here I go. For starters, I banged my head against Wine (and its app database) for the last week or so as iTunes stubbornly refused to install. On my last attempt I finally managed to successfully install iTunes 10.1.1.4 using PlayOnLinux (excellent opensource effort!) and I'd like to document the steps here. 

Wine version: 1.4.1 

Distribution: Ubuntu

Distribution version: 12.04 (Precise) 

Architecture: 64-bit

Graphics card: Some Intel thingy (nothing fancy)

Comments: 

1. Use fresh PlayOnLinux profile. 

2. Download the 32-bit iTunes 10.1.1 or  10.6.3.

2. Use the _testing_ iTunes 10 installation script in PlayOnLinux 4.1.8. (There is a readily available repo for Ubuntu users.)

3. Uncheck *all* autostart, import, shortcut, anything. (See http://appdb.winehq.org/objectManager.php?sClass=version&iId=21302 ) Do NOT ask the installer to open the app once finished. 

4. Do NOT enable AutoRun. 

5. Configure the 'iTunes10' Wine to Windows 7.

6. Launch iTunes to post-configure, and make sure not to have it auto scan for music. 

7. If you get the "The file 'iTunes Library.itl' cannot be read because it was created by a newer version of iTunes" error, then you need to (re)move ~/.PlayOnLinux/wineprefix/iTunes10/drive_c/users/USER/My Documents/Music/iTunes/ . (See http://www.askdavetaylor.com/fixing_itunes_libraryitl_cannot_be_read_newer_version_of_itunes.html )

Now launching iTunes should work. I can't say though if it works (mostly) as expected, but it launches and the UI doesn't flicker, isn't black nor white. In the steps above, I'm not sure what steps are actually necessary or not (I used reports from various sites), but these are the steps that worked for me. 

Edited by landroni

Hi,
First, thanks for the report.

About necessary steps, PlayOnLinux puts iTunes (and programs in general) in separate virtual drives, so it doesn't really matter what you choose on steps 3 and 4 (beside "not starting the app from the installer", which is a general guideline that must be followed for all installations in PlayOnLinux).
Its virtual drives are separate from ~/.wine so I'm not sure what's left of step 1...
I checked that the script leaves the compatibility with XP and not Windows 7 (step 5), but it doesn't seems to prevent iTunes from working. Are there specific features that should be checked?
So, things should work a lot more out-of-the-box than what you describe, which is the point.

Edited by petch

About necessary steps, PlayOnLinux puts iTunes (and programs in general) in separate virtual drives, so it doesn't really matter what you choose on steps 3 and 4 (beside "not starting the app from the installer", which is a general guideline that must be followed for all installations in PlayOnLinux).

Steps 3 through 6 were taken from feedback on the Wine app database. Users reported installer crashes when any of the checkboxes were checked. 

Its virtual drives are separate from ~/.wine so I'm not sure what's left of step 1...

Good point and I removed Wine. But it can still be important to use a fresh PlayOnLinux profile. These days I noticed once that even though Wine and PlayOnLinux didn't display an iTunes app to uninstall, PlayOnLinux had a stray virtual device in its profile. 

I checked that the script leaves the compatibility with XP and not Windows 7 (step 5), but it doesn't seems to prevent iTunes from working. Are there specific features that should be checked?

Not sure. This was recommended on the Wine app database.

So, things should work a lot more out-of-the-box than what you describe, which is the point.

Apart from step 7. Can PlayOnLinux do anything about that? Say, it could (re)move the ~/My Documents/Music/iTunes folder on install. For me this error was a confusing show-stopper for some time. 

About necessary steps, PlayOnLinux puts iTunes (and programs in general) in separate virtual drives, so it doesn't really matter what you choose on steps 3 and 4 (beside "not starting the app from the installer", which is a general guideline that must be followed for all installations in PlayOnLinux).

Steps 3 through 6 were taken from feedback on the Wine app database. Users reported installer crashes when any of the checkboxes were checked.

Fair enough, still I'd like someone to report crashes in POL context before adding it to installation instructions.

Its virtual drives are separate from ~/.wine so I'm not sure what's left of step 1...

Good point and I removed Wine. But it can still be important to use a fresh PlayOnLinux profile. These days I noticed once that even though Wine and PlayOnLinux didn't display an iTunes app to uninstall, PlayOnLinux had a stray virtual device in its profile. 

This can happen the way POL currently works, if either some installation doesn't complete, or if shortcuts are removed without removing the virtual drive.
In 4.1.9 users will get a warning in case of installation over an existing virtual drive, and have the choice between overwrite (current default), erasing the virtual drive first, or cancel the installation altogether.

I checked that the script leaves the compatibility with XP and not Windows 7 (step 5), but it doesn't seems to prevent iTunes from working. Are there specific features that should be checked?

Not sure. This was recommended on the Wine app database.

Even twice, so it must be important ;)
Ok, but for reports it's important to also give feedback about out-of-the-box result, so that script maintainers know if something really needs to be modified. In their situation "if ain't broken don't fix it" is the recommended policy.

So, things should work a lot more out-of-the-box than what you describe, which is the point.

Apart from step 7. Can PlayOnLinux do anything about that? Say, it could (re)move the ~/My Documents/Music/iTunes folder on install. For me this error was a confusing show-stopper for some time. 

Yes, actually it was useful for me too :)
The reason why it happens, even if you scratched the virtual drive before reinstalling, is because during virtual drive initialization Wine makes symlinks from users/$LOGIN/My Documents to $HOME/My Documents or $HOME (if the former doesn't exist), so iTunes' database gets stored outside of its virtual drive.
I'm not sure what's the best behavior here. Would it be less confusing if POL forced users/$LOGIN/My Documents to be a directory? Assuming it doesn't get in the way of files indexation that is.

Regards,
Pierre.

Edited by petch

Yes, actually it was useful for me too :)
The reason why it happens, even if you scratched the virtual drive before reinstalling, is because during virtual drive initialization Wine makes symlinks from users/$LOGIN/My Documents to $HOME/My Documents or $HOME (if the former doesn't exist), so iTunes' database gets stored outside of its virtual drive.
I'm not sure what's the best behavior here. Would it be less confusing if POL forced users/$LOGIN/My Documents to be a directory? Assuming it doesn't get in the way of files indexation that is.

Ouch! This doesn't look nice. My understanding of a Virtual Drive is that, well, nothing gets outside this location and into the "real" world. (This is what you get with VMWare or VirtualBox: Self contained and isolated environments.) But with iTunes (and Wine), its database folder gets right into ~/Music , which for me is unexpected. 

Maybe users should be expected/instructed to create a symlink on their own (for file indexation)? I'm not sure if using a dir would be less confusing or more useful, but it would certainly be a lot safer. 

Wine is in no way a "sandbox", and should not be considered at such. Not even if you only consider its filesystem aspect alone.
In fact, its design choice to "allow to run windows applications seamlessly" contradict with that. To be able to access user files from windows applications, several bridges exist, from special folders that are really symlinks to similar folders in Linux space, to Z: drive mapped to / by default...

Actually I would really like a function to avoid those symlinks; Not to make a security tool out of Wine (which is not possible), but to avoid littering my directories with game state files and folders (http://www.playonmac.com/en/issue-860.html)

I see. This is more complex than I had imagined. It would be nice if, short of a 'sandbox', it were possible to 'uninstall app & user prefs' (something similar that Synaptic proposes on Debian/Ubuntu). That is, if POL kept an index of files belonging to a given app and allowed to remove it when un-installing. (Maybe this is already possible in 4.1.9, but I haven't tested yet.)

Regards

Liviu

Edited by landroni

What makes this possible is a list of the configuration files in the metadata of each package (/var/lib/dpkg/info/*.conffiles).

It is not impossible to come up with a similar list by application (for games at least, some work already exists, see for example http://www.gamesave-manager.com/, http://www.gamesavelocation.com/, http://savegamebackup.net/, http://masgau.org/), but this is not in PlayOnLinux features right now.

(Well ok, work partially done, since configuration files and gamesaves aren't exactly the same thing)

Edited by petch

Thanks for the hints, iTunes now runs here... But has anybody managed to make it synchronize your iPod? I actually installed it only because I wanted to upgrade my old iOS 4.0 on my iPod Touch 3G... Any hints how to do that?

Thanks!

Wine does not support USB, game over.
By the way there's a warning about that in the iTunes 10 install script description (but nobody reads descriptions...)

Edited by petch

(but nobody reads descriptions...)

Perhaps we should incorporate a checkbox on important notes. I know this wouldnt work in script description, but if it was a notification in the install script itself, and we added a function that made the script pause after a very important notices, and will not continue if they do not check the box that says "I have read this note and understand it"? Obviously, this would be up to the scripters discretion, but it could help some misread/human errors from just simply clicking through the installer?

Currently the iTunes script has already been modified to ask "Do you want to install iTunes 10 to sync an USB device?", and if the user answers Yes it stops, explaining the issue.

That doesn't prevent somes users to click No so the script can continue, and then report that syncing doesn't work. That's a lost battle.

Edited by petch

Word. Too bad the iDevice USB support is nil in linux. At least for syncing.

Hello All. I am using Mageia 3 and have found that using iTunes 10.1.1 as suggested in this thread has yielded me a working iTunes! This is after more than 12 months of messing around with Wine settings and different versions of iTunes to no avail, so many, many thanks to the developers of this "test" version of iTunes for Playonlinux.

Having deleted the iTunes folder as suggested to get round the "The file 'iTunes Library.itl' cannot be read because it was created by a newer version of iTunes" problem, I have been able to register, then purchase and download an album.

iTunes does complain each time it is started that it is not installed properly and therefore can't burn or read CDs. This may be due to the aforesaid directory being deleted and then re-created by iTunes.

Note that both iTunes 10 and 10.6.3 did not work for me. 10 crashes on install, and 10.6.3 installs but won't access the iTunes store.

uTunes installing is not the issue. Syncing that stuff to your device is what doesnt work. I know it depends on iOS version. My GF can, for instance, use a regular file manager to drag-and-drop stuff to her iPod Nano, but its as manual as it gets.

As far as I know, there is basically no way to sync itunes and an iPod/iPhone/whatever through wine on Linux. Although, there is no reason not to try. There have been a lot of updates lately with wine, and I have not checked out the release notes on any of them (been super busy), so maybe something has changed? Idunno. I dont purchase Apple products, and surprisingly have few friends with them. haha

DJYoshaBYD, you're assuming that the only reason for wanting to access iTunes is to connect to a device such as an iPod. It isn't. If you want to download an album which is only available on iTunes, and you run Linux, then Playonlinux is the only way I have found to do so. Once downloaded, you can then play it on your media playing PC. This is what I wanted to be able to do. I've got what I wanted, so still many thanks to the developers of this "test" version of iTunes for Playonlinux.