Looking at most (all?) tutorials on how to install Windows apps into Ubuntu, they instruct to add the ppa:ubuntu-wine/ppa repository, and then install the latest wine (currently wine1.5).
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntu-wine/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install wine1.5
Wine is also available in the official repositories, and the following command works (without having to add a new repository):
sudo apt-get install wine
So. Why should I prefer the ppa? What is missing in the official wine that I should use the ppa instead?
Best Answer
The WINE ppa offers a later version of WINE than the repos do. The current stable version of WINE (in the Ubuntu repos) is 1.4.1; 1.5 is a beta version.
By recommending that you install WINE from the PPA, these tutorials you speak of a really suggesting installing a beta version of WINE. The beta version has support for more Windows programs, but that support has not been perfected yet, which is why Ubuntu doesn't add the beta versions to their repos.