Run Windows application on Linux server

Question

Run Windows application on Linux server

S Abijith 496

Hi All,
We have a Winforms application with a very minimum UI. We are currently using .Net Framework 4.5. We need to run this application on a Linux machine. We are currently considering migrating the .Net Framework to .Net Core.

Please let us know if there any other better approach to achieve this task or if we can continue with .Net Core.

Any help would be appreciated. Thank you!!

David Lowndes 4,731 Reputation points

2021-03-05T09:05:39.333+00:00

If you're considering making it a console application, .NET Core should be fine.
S Abijith 496 Reputation points

2021-03-15T04:45:01.503+00:00

Sorry for the late response.
Yes, it will be a console application and as per suggestion, we will go ahead with .Net Core.

Thank you for your response!!
S Abijith 496 Reputation points

2021-03-29T09:10:35.45+00:00

Hello All,
As we are considering using .Net Core, can anyone suggest which version of .Net Core would be better.

Is it better to use .Net Core 3.1 or .Net Core 5.0?? Can anyone please let us know on this.

Thank you in advance!!

3 answers

Your answer

David Lowndes 4,731 Reputation points

2021-03-05T09:05:39.333+00:00

If you're considering making it a console application, .NET Core should be fine.
S Abijith 496 Reputation points

2021-03-15T04:45:01.503+00:00

Sorry for the late response.
Yes, it will be a console application and as per suggestion, we will go ahead with .Net Core.

Thank you for your response!!
S Abijith 496 Reputation points

2021-03-29T09:10:35.45+00:00

Hello All,
As we are considering using .Net Core, can anyone suggest which version of .Net Core would be better.

Is it better to use .Net Core 3.1 or .Net Core 5.0?? Can anyone please let us know on this.

Thank you in advance!!

Answer 1

Roflush 11

If you are running an app in Linux it will be fine .net framework is cross-comp is great for running them.
You just have to download Mono or the .net run time to run apps. (WPF apps use Microsoft's DX to render the app, so you can't use that app on Linux or Mac)

Developing them however is a wildly hard idea. Winforms is sadly outdated, while MS is trying to update it, the legacy code really bad. You should look into migrating to
Avalonia UI. It's an Open Source, Cross-platform UI library like WinForms (that is an understatement). If you want to stay on WinForms however Mono supports in runtime and SDK. proof of concept for WinForms running in Linux using Mono

Really Avalonia replaces both WPF and WinForms.

cheong00 3,491 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator

2021-03-20T16:11:08.853+00:00

Not knew this framework before. Sounds interesting and will definitely take a look.

Answer 2

Alejandro Castrejon 6

Why don't install Mono runtime on linux to run your .net winforms application ?

I did it to run a winform application on raspberry (Debian)

cheong00 3,491 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator

2021-03-17T01:23:15.967+00:00

Agreed. You can just continue to code for .NET Framework 4.X and ignore about .NET Core/.NET 5 for now.

I've written a few .NET v1.1 application that runs on Linux with Mono 10+ years ago and it needs very little changes to work. (The changes I needed to make are mostly due to filesystem permission difference)

Answer 3

cheong00 3,491 Volunteer Moderator

.NET 5 introduce limited support for WinForm, so you may give it a try.

You're strongly advised to review what is not supported and replace them with alternatives before start conversion.

David Lowndes 4,731 Reputation points

2021-03-05T09:22:58.51+00:00

Although .NET 5 supports WinForms, it's only on Windows AFAIK.
David Lowndes 4,731 Reputation points

2021-03-05T09:24:46.827+00:00

.NET 5 WinForms is Windows only I believe.
cheong00 3,491 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator

2021-03-05T09:46:36.457+00:00

Oh, you're right. Apologies for the mistake.

In that case, to use GUI on Linux you'll need some cross platform libraries like Xamarin.

Note that the GTK# that it based on is still on preview.
David Lowndes 4,731 Reputation points

2021-03-05T09:54:48.837+00:00

I don't believe Xamarin does Linux GUI - though I might be wrong.
cheong00 3,491 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator

2021-03-05T10:05:16.843+00:00

It's there as of late 2018.

Although everything (I mean both GTK#, and the GTK# target for Xamarin.Forms) is still in preview, I suppose applications built with simple and general Windows control would have decent chance to work with it.

Apparently they "settled" the "QC problem" by explicitly offload support to the community, in order to move forward.
Roflush 11 Reputation points

2021-03-20T11:03:15.97+00:00

Just use Avalonia
Roflush 11 Reputation points

2021-03-20T11:09:39.227+00:00

Mono supports WinForms... (Posted in my answer)

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