How to run Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop and InDesign

Question

I'm using an Asus Eee PC running Ubuntu 13.04 (it was gnome 12.04). Before I installed Ubuntu I was using "Windows 7 Home Premium" which ran pretty laggy. So I decided using Ubuntu. I took a bootable USB with Ubuntu 12.04 and dropped the Win 7 OS of my eee PC. The Eee PC doesn't have a disk drive included. Ubuntu runs the way I expected, superior!

Right now I wanna open My Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop and Adobe InDesign files to edit my projects. In Ubuntu with Wine, I am unable to install the CS3, CS4 or CS5 ISOs cause they split up after mounting. The files couldn't load in Adobe installer.

I tried another option running a portable in Wine. This will install but won't open.

As third option I tried is VirtualMachine. But since I dropped the windows boot partition even VM can't read this. I am willing to install Windows 7 next to my 13.04, but I need to make a bootable USB for that I guess?

I'm not an expert in IT, I'm a graphics designer. And right now I really need those Files to be opened and edited. Can someone help me the easiest way? Just installing CS4 from ISO would be the best for me... but if there any other options Help Me Out!

Solution 1

Alternative software for designing in Ubuntu

• Adobe Photoshop --> GIMP
• Adobe Illustrator --> Inkscape
• Adobe inDesign --> Scribus

Solution 2

Most people will tell you to either use Gimp or Krita as an alternative to Photoshop but as someone that does a lot of design work, neither of them are even close to being a replacement for Photoshop.

Luckily Photoshop CC 2018 runs extremely well in wine, so you have two options to get it to work on your Linux pc:

• Install if from Adobe CC with PlayOnLinux
• Copy an already installed windows Photoshop folder and run it through Wine

Playonlinux works pretty well, however the biggest problem is that you cannot open new files. You can get around this by opening another file and changing its size to what you need, but it's hacky and I wouldn't recommend it at all.

If you want more info on this you can check out creative-cloud-linux which allows installation from the Adobe CC app.

If instead you want to use wine, which I recommend, the WineHQ page has everything you need to set it up and all you need is a Windows pc with Photoshop already installed on it.

The WineHQ guide is a bit unclear and might confuse new users however. When you're told to run

winetricks fontsmooth=rgb gdiplus vcrun2008 vcrun2010 vcrun2012 vcrun2013 vcrun2015 msxml3 msxml6 gdiplus corefonts

the guide actually means you should run:

WINEPREFIX=/path/to/directory winetricks fontsmooth=rgb gdiplus vcrun2008 vcrun2010 vcrun2012 vcrun2013 vcrun2015 msxml3 msxml6 gdiplus corefonts

If that step is skipped, photoshop will still run but it will be missing fonts and most functions will be broken.

Edit: The wine guide also says you should download "amtlib" with the above command. I suspect this is used for cracking Photoshop. Either way the download doesn't work, and keeping it in the command will stop corefonts, msxml3, msxml6 and gdiplus from installing. Make sure you use the above command and not the one on the guide.

[I hope it's okay for me to answer such an old question, I saw that it had a lot of views but no definitive answer so I gave it a go]

Comments

[MadMike]

Eee-PCs are seriously under-powered systems. Why would you use one to run Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop and InDesign to begin with?

[Lapzwans]

I know itś underpowered thats why I even wanna Use CS3.. But if the alternative programs run better with the same file extensions then im gonna try it right away. I really need to open my files on this crappy Eee PC :')

[MadMike]

Your best bet is to install an run these with PlayOnLinux.

[Lapzwans]

So when i try the portable version CS5 wil it run? I noticed Scribus doesn't support .Indd

[MadMike]

Although I have experience with PlayOnlinux, I have next to no experience with CS. On a related note here is how to install CS5 on Ubuntu

[Lapzwans]

Can I open my Ai files and make my bussiness identity for a facture or edit my Vcard?

[karel]

I have both Adobe Photoshop and GIMP and I like GIMP better than Photoshop.

[Lapzwans]

But does it keep the same file extensions and does it read them too?