flash.exe files

[Hiisi]

Hi, List!
Correct me if I'm wrong, but there's no way to run windows exe flash
movies under linux without wine? I have a foreign language video 
tutorial packaged for windows users. On the course dvd there's all data
(video lessons, images and texts in xml format). Testing it under
VirtualBox windoze xp reveals that main executable (start.exe) opening
flash player with different menus and buttons. Without that it's
difficult to organize all that stuff in right order. However performance
of video under VirtualBox is very poor. And I don't want to install wine
on my machine. It would be a big hole in security. So, any suggestions?
TIA

[James McKenzie]

On 11/30/10 1:04 AM, Hiisi wrote:
> Hi, List!
> Correct me if I'm wrong, but there's no way to run windows exe flash
> movies under linux without wine? I have a foreign language video
> tutorial packaged for windows users. On the course dvd there's all data
> (video lessons, images and texts in xml format). Testing it under
> VirtualBox windoze xp reveals that main executable (start.exe) opening
> flash player with different menus and buttons. Without that it's
> difficult to organize all that stuff in right order. However performance
> of video under VirtualBox is very poor. And I don't want to install wine
> on my machine. It would be a big hole in security. So, any suggestions?
> TIA

Wine is no less secure than any other program you run on your Linux box 
in USER space.  However, the project highly recommends against running 
as a super-user.

You might want to give it a go since you proved the program is somewhat 
secure.

James McKenzie

[Hiisi]

ti, 2010-11-30 kello 08:50 -0700, James McKenzie kirjoitti:
> Wine is no less secure than any other program you run on your Linux
> box 
> in USER space.  However, the project highly recommends against
> running 
> as a super-user.
>
> You might want to give it a go since you proved the program is
> somewhat 
> secure.
>
> James McKenzie

Well, if I have wine installed (and my system is opened for windoze
viruses) what should I use to open that flash.exe file? Firefox and
flash-player for windoze?

[Steve Searle]

Around 10:31pm on Tuesday, November 30, 2010 (UK time), Hiisi scrawled:
> Well, if I have wine installed (and my system is opened for windoze
> viruses) what should I use to open that flash.exe file? Firefox and
> flash-player for windoze?

I assume that it is a (Windows) executable file and you don't open in in
anything - you just run it. Maybe it's a self executing zip file.

Steve

[Kevin Cummings]

On 11/30/2010 05:57 PM, Steve Searle wrote:
> Around 10:31pm on Tuesday, November 30, 2010 (UK time), Hiisi scrawled:
> > Well, if I have wine installed (and my system is opened for windoze
> > viruses) what should I use to open that flash.exe file? Firefox and
> > flash-player for windoze?
>
> I assume that it is a (Windows) executable file and you don't open in in
> anything - you just run it. Maybe it's a self executing zip file.

If its a self-extracting zip file, then you should be able to read its
table with the linux unzip command....
> Steve

[Hiisi]

ti, 2010-11-30 kello 18:01 -0500, Kevin J. Cummings kirjoitti:
> On 11/30/2010 05:57 PM, Steve Searle wrote:
> > I assume that it is a (Windows) executable file and you don't open in in
> > anything - you just run it. Maybe it's a self executing zip file.
>
> If its a self-extracting zip file, then you should be able to read its
> table with the linux unzip command....
> > Steve

On windowz side clicking onto this file results in opening of flash
video with menu, links to different lessons, etc.
Here's the output of unzip command:
]$ unzip start.exe
Archive:  start.exe
  End-of-central-directory signature not found.  Either this file is not
  a zipfile, or it constitutes one disk of a multi-part archive.  In the
  latter case the central directory and zipfile comment will be found on
  the last disk(s) of this archive.
unzip:  cannot find zipfile directory in one of start.exe or
        start.exe.zip, and cannot find start.exe.ZIP, period.

[Kevin Cummings]

On 11/30/2010 06:17 PM, Hiisi wrote:
> On windowz side clicking onto this file results in opening of flash
> video with menu, links to different lessons, etc.
> Here's the output of unzip command:
> ]$ unzip start.exe
> Archive:  start.exe
>   End-of-central-directory signature not found.  Either this file is not
>   a zipfile, or it constitutes one disk of a multi-part archive.  In the
>   latter case the central directory and zipfile comment will be found on
>   the last disk(s) of this archive.
> unzip:  cannot find zipfile directory in one of start.exe or
>         start.exe.zip, and cannot find start.exe.ZIP, period.

Then its *not* a self-extracting ZIP archive.  That doesn't mean it
isn't some other kind of self-extracting archive, or even some kind of
executable Flash program that I am not aware of....

[Tom Horsley]

On Tue, 30 Nov 2010 18:38:41 -0500
Kevin J. Cummings wrote:
> Then its *not* a self-extracting ZIP archive.  That doesn't mean it
> isn't some other kind of self-extracting archive, or even some kind of
> executable Flash program that I am not aware of....

One of the things windows KVMs and copy on write filesystems are good
for. I can boot up the virtual machine, get the unknown program loaded,
disconnect the network, then run the program in as isolated an environment
as possible :-).

If it screws up the windows machine, I can revert back to the original
state of the qcow2 filesystem.

[Marko Vojinovic]

On Tuesday 30 November 2010 22:31:46 Hiisi wrote:
> Well, if I have wine installed (and my system is opened for windoze
> viruses) what should I use to open that flash.exe file? Firefox and
> flash-player for windoze?

Just open a terminal, type

wine flash.exe

and see what happens. :-) If it is a standalone program it should just run.

Btw, I don't think your system is open for Windows viruses just by installing 
wine. Typically wine has trouble running even legitimate programs made for 
Windows (since it still doesn't translate *all* features of Windows OS into 
Linux environment), let alone viruses which deliberately have "dirty" code and 
use quirks, bugs and holes of the Windows OS. Typically wine cannot emulate 
those bugs and holes so effectively as the original Windows :-) , so AFAIK 
viruses would typically fail to run under wine. Of course, YMMV. Also, you 
would need to be stupid enough to type "wine my-favorite-virus.exe" in the 
terminal to actually run the thing, I doubt it would run as automatically as 
in Windows... ;-) Then again, I might be wrong, I'm no expert on wine, just an 
occasional user.

HTH, :-)
Marko

[James McKenzie]

On 11/30/10 7:50 PM, Marko Vojinovic wrote:
> On Tuesday 30 November 2010 22:31:46 Hiisi wrote:
> > Well, if I have wine installed (and my system is opened for windoze
> > viruses) what should I use to open that flash.exe file? Firefox and
> > flash-player for windoze?
>
> Just open a terminal, type
>
> wine flash.exe
>
> and see what happens. :-) If it is a standalone program it should just run.
>
> Btw, I don't think your system is open for Windows viruses just by installing
> wine. Typically wine has trouble running even legitimate programs made for
> Windows (since it still doesn't translate *all* features of Windows OS into
> Linux environment), let alone viruses which deliberately have "dirty" code and
> use quirks, bugs and holes of the Windows OS. Typically wine cannot emulate
> those bugs and holes so effectively as the original Windows :-) , so AFAIK
> viruses would typically fail to run under wine. Of course, YMMV. Also, you
> would need to be stupid enough to type "wine my-favorite-virus.exe" in the
> terminal to actually run the thing, I doubt it would run as automatically as
> in Windows... ;-) Then again, I might be wrong, I'm no expert on wine, just an
> occasional user.

Google Wine Virus and see what you get back.  Remember, Wine is designed 
to be run as a normal user and what you can reach, it can too.

However, work is ongoing to continuously improve Wine.

James McKenzie