Looking for suggestions to workaround NSBasic AppStudio IE requirement

[rcarraretto]

Hello,

I'm trying to run https://www.appstudio.dev and most of the app run fine since Wine 5.x, it still does in 6.0, except for a "small", but relevant detail. The application is a development IDE focused on Web/Android/iOS apps. The IDE has a coding panel (works fine) and a design panel, to position the web controls (form Bootstrap, for example). The issue is that it relies on IE11 to render the design panel (it's basically HTML/CSS) and it looks for something that the Wine-Internet Explorer can't offer. I know IE11 won't be supported under Wine (and won't be under Microsoft either by August 17th 2021), so I'm wondering what would enable the app to see the internal Wine-Gecko HTML renderer instead of IE11's. Any ideas?

Thanks
Ricardo

[fargodwe]

I installed the demo from the link you posted, but I don't have a clue about using it. Can you give step-by-step instructions until the error occurs? I noticed a message box with something about failing on Internet Explorer reload.

[savelov]

I assume the scenario is below -
launch AppStudio.exe
press continue demo on the registration screen
then it asks for an example - load TwoForms project
then the middle window with a form is a design panel, which causes the internet explorer error

[fargodwe]

I get a message box about "Internet Explorer reload timeout. Please try again" when I just start the app and at various places while in the app. I clicked in the design area with no problem. Clicked on each form and then on code with no problems (again just clicked ok on error box). Ran using desktop browser, clicked on the screen that said it was using the demo, then I get a text area that is showing part of the code instead of what I think it is supposed to be showing (the ability to click and go to form2). Is this error?

[fargodwe]

So I tried to follow as best I could what this was supposed to do and outside of the error messages that at least to me don't seem to hurt anything this seems to work for me. My only browser in Linux Mint is Firefox, and I did not install a browser to wine. The app starts up in Firefox and seems to run fine. I can "next" "prev" as much as I want and it seems to be working fine.

I am also running this in a 64-bit prefix. Perhaps you should try installing to a new 64-bit prefix and not installing any browser to wine and see if it works in your linux system's browser. I think it would also depend on having libxml2 installed in your linux system if it isn't already.

[fargodwe]

Too late to edit again, dang it. I reread your opening post and didn't understand something then but now I see what you were getting at. It's the actual form design window that's not working, correct? I'll have to try that. Sorry for the confusion and I won't post again. Sorry!

[rcarraretto]

Yes, and sorry for not replying you back earlier. The challenge is to get the Design elements to show up in the Design screen. According to NS Basic, AppStudio depends on IE11 being installed on Windows to work and I assume that it uses some IE dll to render the HTML/CSS piece of the Design screen.

If you right click on the Design screen, all available controls will be displayed and by selecting any one, it will eventually show the "Internet Explorer reload failed" error message, but everything else works (the control gets added to the form navigator in the left panel, you can adjust any of the control properties). The App will deploy to its built-in HTTP server running in Node.js and the default Linux browser will open it as any web page. It is "just" the Design screen that I can't get to work. I'm kind of new to Wine debugging, so perhaps by turning on the right debug flags, we could know which component/DLL the app is trying to load before showing the error box.

[rcarraretto]

Quick update: I tried WINEDEBUG=+relay and WINEDEBUG=+relay,+msgbox and the app gets to "Continue with trial" window, but then crashes afterwards. If I remove the debug flags, then the app runs and, of course, shows the same behavior and the msgbox "Internet Explorer reload timeout". Any hints?