Cross browser web testing on Linux - Playonlinux

For the past year I have been running a full blown PC inside a virtual machine (vmware) in order to allow me to run Internet Explorer, Chrome and various other Windows based web browsers. Don't get me wrong, I have no desire to run Internet Explorer! But, as a web developer it's kind of a necessity. There is not much point in developing a website that half the worlds surfers can't see properly.

Of course, running a full blown virtual machine is perhaps overkill just to do a bit of cross browser testing. Another option might be IEs4linux - but it really isn't worth the effort. Even after getting it working, I found it to be buggy as hell and often less painful to just boot up the virtual machine instead.

Playonlinux

Last week I struck gold when I found PlayOnLinux. PlayOnLinux is a piece of software which allows you to easily install and use numerous games and software designed to run with Microsoft's Windows. You simply install it on your Linux machine, which for most distributions can be done through your package manager (I installed directly through aptitude). Once you have it installed an running, you can simply click on the 'Install' button where you are presented with a vast array of PC programs that you can install. There are hundreds of games since that is the focus of the application, however also included in the list is:

• Google Chrome
• Internet Explorer 6
• Internet Explorer 7
• Mozilla Firefox
• Opera 9
• Safari

It's almost like the Synaptic package manager on Ubuntu - installing any one of these browsers is as simple as clicking the install button! Behind the scenes it actually appears to be installing wine, and all the necessary extras required to run the application you are installing (fonts, dlls etc etc). The end result is a selection of fully working* PC browsers, directly in Ubuntu, or whatever other flavour of Linux it is that floats your boat!

One thing is for sure, its a hell of a lot less CPU intensive than running a VM, 100 times simpler than attempting to install and configure each of the browsers under wine yourself, and from my experience (granted, that is only a weeks usage) it all runs bug free.

* Fully working is perhaps a little of an overstatement. I have noticed some slight inconsistencies in font rendering, and the interface for IE seems a little broken. Though very usable for cross browser testing, I would still fire up the vm for a final test before releasing into the wild.