Linux Servers + Wine = #Nightmare
I usually use FreeBSD or macOS (OS X Server) for servers.
I rarely use Linux, for reasons I will not divulge in this article, on my personal servers, corporate server or for any customers' servers.
I was requested to look at a server, which was running Proxmox VE, which I am very familiar with having used it since late 2008, from early releases.
On top of Proxmox were a few VMs:
Linux:
Debian * 8
Fedora * 2
Mint * 8
Ubuntu * 4
Windows (all * 1)
Windows XP
Windows 7
Windows 8.1
Windows 10
Windows Server (all * 2)
Windows Server 2003
Windows Server 2008 R2
Windows Server 2012
Windows Server 2016
The server owner was experiencing troubles with availability.
An "IT GUY" has set up the server, which had an eight-core Intel Xeon CPU and 64 GB of RAM.
The server owner was told to shut down VMs when they were not needed.
The server owner did not understand when shutting down VMs, that stops all of the applications running on the VMs.
He was shutting down mail servers, domain servers and all sorts of application servers, all of which were required for day to day running of the business.
I have advised purchasing another server to balance the load and give the current server a breather.
The above was not the real, full blown #Nightmare.
Linux Server + Wine + Windows Apps
The "IT GUY" had set up Wine for the Linux VMs which is fine to do.
What he had done was reference all of the same files with no hierarchy across all of the Linux VMs.
This caused horrendous issues with file versions and hierarchical mayhem.
The wine was so annoying I had to rebuild the Linux VMs and work out what was needed, where it was needed and how the hierarchy should be.
An "IT GUY" should not dump files as if they are being placed in the bin.
Wine is a pain for multiple user servers.
It is designed for a single user server at most; usually used on VMs or home computers running Linux with one user.
To run your Windows apps on the Linux server when you have Windows servers running is a bit foolish.
I freshened up the server, gave it a shot of optimisation and it is working well.
I will never suggest using Wine on a Linux server.
I am all for containerisation, but Wine is not doing anything for Linux servers.