Comments on: Quicken 2008 for Ubuntu Linux?

By: Richard J. Lawrence

Richard J. Lawrence — Thu, 20 Oct 2011 10:59:03 +0000

I have read all of the above, and there seems to be a lot of conflicting opinions. Has anyone succeeded in converting quicken backup files to files that can be read into a Linux based financial tool? I use only a very small number of the Quicken features just to keep track of expenditures from various credit cards –I like the history — when did I purchase that TV (is it beyond warentee etc.). So I could get by with an inferior program as long as it isn’t buggy and as long as I can get my Quicen history converted to it. I am leary of things like wine and crossover and that sort of thing. Alternatively, is there a cloud application that has a one time cost (not like Quickbook with its monthly fee) that will inport Quicken backup files? I find windows just too insecure and at least twice a year my laptop needs to go into a shop for malware eradication. I paid $162 yesterday and after working on it for 5 tech hours over a period of three days their remained one root kit virus that they couldn’t kill that causes some programs to become nonresponsive intermittantly. I don’t have time to do a reinstall of the OS and all my programs. I have dabbled with Ubuntu a little and like it, but my dependence on Quicken and Encore (a music program) are keeping me MSWindows bound. I envy young people who started out with Linux and have no need to convert anything.

By: redxine

redxine — Fri, 29 Apr 2011 03:08:32 +0000

According to the ubuntu website (http://www.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/features/office-applications) Quicken is available in the Software Centre for the newly released Ubuntu 11.04 Natty Narwhal. I’ve yet to download and install it, and I’ll be stuck with 10.04 for a while for my tablet drivers until I sit down and port them.

By: JohnP

JohnP — Sun, 19 Dec 2010 00:03:42 +0000

Quicken 2011 Premium installs under the current WINE on Ubuntu with just a few extra settings / steps. These days, it really isn’t very hard to get working.

Here’s how:
http://blog.jdpfu.com/2010/11/29/solved-quicken-2011-working-on-linux

I believe older versions will work with this config too.

By: Winger

Winger — Sun, 09 May 2010 21:26:23 +0000

I have the same problem as others who have responded. Years of necessary brokerage and financial data tied up in Quicken that I can’t afford to lose. I don’t know if any of the financial packages available in Linux would be sufficient as there does not seem to be an adequate way to transfer my data into them.

I also have another problem. I require a good speech recognition program. I have read that Wine can be used to install Naturally Speaking, but I have had little success with Wine.

Other than this, I could make a complete transition to Linux.

Winger

By: WL Collins

WL Collins — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 16:39:08 +0000

Re the import/export of Email and contact information . I would suggest you try Kmail as an intermediate step . It will import and export to many file types . I have used it to get my evolution contacts into a CSV file which I can use almost any where . Although I like Evolution, getting the contacts out is not supported natively, but with Kmail, I can pull them into Kmail and output into a variety of formats . The only caviat is to be aware of SCHEMA issues between the different programs . Hope this is of some value.

By: Comprador

Comprador — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 20:31:39 +0000

Rich, so what did you think of Moneydance?

By: rich

rich — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 23:21:13 +0000

Im about to try this out:

http://moneydance.com/linux

By: Mike Olsen

Mike Olsen — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 14:01:07 +0000

I exported all my contacts to Google mail, from Outlook and into Evolution. Then I setup Evolution to connect to Google for my calendar. Then, with my corporate email on my XP PC, which uses Exchange, I setup IMAP, and Copied all of my mail from my Exchange Folder or Off line Folders, into my IMAP Folders, so it had the same folder setup as my Outlook. Then I setup Evolution with my IMAP for my corporate email. Then installed Google Calendar Sync on my Windows PC to Sync my Outlook Calendar with my Google Account. Then I setup Evolution to connect to my Google Calendar, which was a simple task. Now I had Evolution setup to my Corporate Email though IMAP, and it had the exact same Folder and Email that my Outlook had. And It had all of my Contacts from Outlook. And it had all of the years of my Outlook Appointments in my Calendar. I got Evolution to handle all of my Outlook needs. Then I switched my Smart Phone to work with Google’s new Push mail and it Sync’s my Calendar, Email & Contacts. Then I also setup my Corporate Email via IMAP in my Smart Phone. Now, my Smart Phone is just like it was when it was hooked up to my Exchange server and I was able to Switch over to Linux and use Evolution for a complete replacement for Outlook. I do however have the same issue with Quicken or Quickbooks. GNUCash sucks and nothing compares. And no recent Intuit products in Wine have reached Platinum Status and I have found bugs in all Intuit Products in Wine. So I still have a PC setup for my bookkeeping, but I do love the freedom of Free and Open Source Software and having a more secure O/S. I have NEVER had a security issue with any of my Linux boxes.

By: Ted

Ted — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 20:17:54 +0000

For me it is wanting to do certain secure type functions such as online banking in an environment that is safer from malware. When you are up against things like Clampi which is potentially sitting on your windows box waiting to steal your banking credentials, it makes me think going through the pain of getting money management and banking off of the windows platform and onto something that is supposed to be a bit safer, is worth the effort. I do what I can in the windows environement to avoid being compromised but can never really feel that safe.

By: Gary

Gary — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 08:50:34 +0000

Jeff Latten: If you are addicted to Outlook and spend around 80% of you time in there then why the hell would you want to leave your cosy windows setup.

Stay windows and forget about Linux or posting about Linux – you’re happy where you are and Linux folks would like you to stay there I think.

Here are the versions of Firefox3 and Openoffice3 in the current Ubuntu release (9.04)

http://packages.ubuntu.com/jaunty/firefox
http://packages.ubuntu.com/jaunty/openoffice.org

If you want to be a bit more bleading edge and run firefox 3.5 then it is there and just do:
sudo apt-get install firefox-3.5

and you are good to go.

By: Jeff Latten

Jeff Latten — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 16:40:04 +0000

Bob, I agree with you completely. I have so many years of personal and business data in quicken and quickbooks. I have yet to find an Ubuntu program to equal either of these two programs, or even one that can correctly import data from them. I’ve tried GNUcash, KMyMoney (not sure about that title) and some others, but they’re junk in my estimation compared to the Intuit programs. Same issue with Outlook; I haven’t found an Ubuntu based email program that will correctly import any kind of export file from Outlook. I have hundreds of contacts and years of data in there and I’m not going to re-type everything.

I think this is one of the factors holding back the growth and dispersion of Linux/Ubuntu…the apps are not up to the quality of the OS, particularly in these two very vital areas – finance and email. I’d say that Quicken and Outlook might be the 20% of my programs that I do 80% of my work with. The old 80/20 rule never fails!

By: Bob

Bob — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 16:55:05 +0000

I’ve been trying to get Quicken 2007 up with Crossover in Ubuntu 9.04 for weeks now. The customer service at codeweavers has been helping out, but still no go.

I’ve followed the step on this page as per codeweavers recommendation, but it did not help:
http://www.codeweavers.com/compatibility/browse/name/?app_id=2634;tips=1

I can start Quicken, but every time it tries to set up a new QDF file or open an existing one the program just closes (without even saying goodbye).

I’m going to try opening the exe on my XP partition as suggested above. Maybe that’ll work for me. Otherwise, I guess I’ll learn how to install a xVM and go that way.

I love Linux and Ubuntu, and would love to be able to migrate over completely over to it. But I’ve been using Quicken for too many years to go over to a new program, unless it take my existing QDF and convert them with minimal setup.

By: tmsbrdrs

tmsbrdrs — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 02:31:59 +0000

Brian, another way to find .wine is to open up your home folder, click View and click Show Hidden Files.

By: Marcio

Marcio — Sun, 31 May 2009 19:30:59 +0000

Brian, since three days has passed by after your post I believe you have found the answer, otherwise you can do:

- In the main menu chose ‘places >> home folder’;
- On the file browser window, locate a button which its icon is a sheet of paper and a pen on the tools bar and click on it to show the ‘location’ input field;
- For the location, type ‘~/.wine’ and hit enter. It should go into the “.wine” directory.

Yes, it is a hidden directory. Any file or directory which its name start with a dot is a hidden file/dir.

Hope this helps.

By: Brian

Brian — Thu, 28 May 2009 18:16:24 +0000

I’m a Ubuntu 9.04 newbie. How do I navigate to .wine? I can’t seem to find it. Is is a hidden folder?

By: Michael

Michael — Fri, 15 May 2009 12:40:05 +0000

I have had no luck getting Quicken 2009 to work yet using Wine or CrossOver though there are some claims out there people have using Ubuntu (I used the same methods).

But I made a nice discovery about Wine – if you’re running a dual-boot Windows/Ubuntu box like me, install the programs in Windows, then navigate to that program’s exe file, right click and choose “Open with ‘Wine Windows Program Loader” – many programs that can’t be “installed” in Wine, will just run in Wine this way – including TaxCut and a slew of others (but not Quicken 2009, yet). I don’t know why this is, but it works.

I also have gotten font smoothing installed in Wine, too, which is nice.

One most programs are installed in Windows, if you want you can copy over their Program Files folder to .wine/drive_c/Program Files, their dlls to .wine/drive_c/Windows/System 32 and fonts to .wine/drive_c/Windows/Fonts

Then you can use right click as mentioned above and run them in your Linux partition.

- Michael

By: Irfan

Irfan — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 04:04:54 +0000

Quicken 2007 works perfectly well using Linux Crossover. Someone said “Wine nightmare” earlier: haha. It’s just as easy to install Quicken using Crossover as it is on Windows, you don’t even have to reboot afterwards. Quicken 2008 is also said to work without problems: in the next release of Crossover, due out this year, 2009 will be supported (as well as CS3 and a few other programs.)

By: Michael

Michael — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 19:57:32 +0000

Hi Robert. I’m running the show with Linux. Luckily, you found my forum. Please make a list of your complaints here and I will see to it that they are fixed ASAP.

Unfortunately, it can sometimes be difficult for me to coordinate the thousands of volunteer and paid programmers around the world who work on our various distributions (such as Ubuntu), so you may experience a slight delay in our response. If you want to speed things up, please consider getting involved. It takes a little bit of work to get oriented, but we’d love to have you on our team.

In the meantime, I’ve just created a feature to help beginning users such as yourself: it’s called the MAN pages, and I’m very excited about it. It’s not super flashy yet, but my hope is that it will get you going in the right direction.

You might also try googling for a beginner’s guide to linux.

Best of Luck,

Michael McCarrin

By: Pete

Pete — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 15:47:44 +0000

Having used the Sun xVM recently I must say its a nice option for those “work” applications. I must say Linux has come VERY far in the last few years. Thanks to all who have put in the hours working on the project.

By: Rory

Rory — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 16:40:03 +0000

I just want to make a comment on the use of wines/Crossovers etc. To have a 100% windows compatibility running programs like quicken, quickbooks, Photoshop, Lightroom etc. Rather install the free Sun xVM Virtual Box software and create a virtual windows OS Machine. From this you can run your Apps, with zero compatibility problems.