Google is funding work to ensure that Adobe Systems' Photoshop and other Creative Suite software will run on Linux.

For the project, Google is funding programmers at CodeWeavers, a company whose open-source Wine software lets Windows software run on Linux. Wine is a compatibility layer that intercepts a program's Windows commands and converts them to instructions for the Linux kernel and its graphics subsystem.

"We hired CodeWeavers to make Photoshop CS and CS2 work better under Wine," Dan Kegel, of Google's software engineering team and the Wine 1.0 release manager, said on Google's open-source blog. "Photoshop is one of those applications that desktop Linux users are constantly clamouring for, and we're happy to say they work pretty well now...We look forward to further improvements in this area."

A survey by desktop Linux advocate Novell found Photoshop is the top non-Linux application that Linux users would like to have. Although Adobe has dipped its toes into the desktop Linux waters, so far it hasn't made any major moves.

With current technology trends, Adobe may never see the need for a Linux version. Virtualisation software from companies such as Parallels and VMware, and improving support from chipmakers Advanced Micro Devices and Intel, it's getting easier to run multiple operating systems on the same computer.

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