Installing and Running Safari 4 on Ubuntu Linux

Installing and Running Safari 4 on Ubuntu Linux: As some of you may know, Apple's Safari is the default browser of Mac OS X and iPhone OS. Safari 4, the latest version of the browser, offers a lot of features and noticeable performance improvements over its predecessor.

There are already a number of releases of Safari for Windows but none for Linux so far. However, that doesn't mean that we can't install and run Safari on Linux. Here's a step-by-step guide on installing and running Safari 4 on Ubuntu Linux:

Step-1: Install Wine. The easiest way to download and install Wine is via Ubuntu Software Center or Synaptic Package Manager.

Step-2: Download winetricks using this command:

wget http://www.kegel.com/wine/winetricks

Step-3: Install winetricks, corefonts, and flash.

sh winetricks corefonts flash

Step-4: Download Safari for Windows from HERE.

Step-5: Navigate to where you saved the Safari installer and open it through Wine with this command:

wine SafariSetup.exe

Step-6: Install Safari but make sure to uncheck (deselect) the "Install Bonjour for Windows" and "Automatically update Safari..." options.

Step-7: Start Safari by navigating to Applications --> Wine --> Programs --> Safari --> Safari.

A few notes:

* Safari will crash the first time you run it because of the welcome animation, but should work after that.

* If Flash was not successfully installed, manually download and install it while using Safari on Linux.

* Opening a new tab in Safari may cause it to crash. To fix this, open Safari preferences, and in "General" category, set "New tabs open with:" option to "Empty Page".

Here are a few screenshots of Safari 4 running inside my Ubuntu Linux desktop:

Safari 4 on Ubuntu

Safari 4 running side-by-side with Firefox (click to enlarge)