[plug] Greetings Pluggers :) >>> Wine && E-Tax

[Michael Collard]

On Sun, 2004-09-26 at 00:16, Julian Clark wrote:
> Hi Everyone,
> 
> I've just subscribed to the mailing list, and at the recommendation of a 
> friend of mine, am just going to share a little of the joy I experienced 
> with Wine and the ATO's etax software.
> 
> So here's my first post, let's hope that it doesn't bore you too much.
> 
> :)
> 
> Firstly, a little of the specs of what I am running.
> Gentoo Linux (2.4.25 kernel), KDE 3.2 for my Window manager running on a 
> box full of the cheapest new hardware I could find at the time. :)
> 
> Steps..
> Gentoo's install process utilises emerge (debian users think apt-get)
> which I utilised to grab the latest unstable  (think not quite 
> thoroughly tested) release of wine that Gentoo offers. (at this stage 
> wine20040716)
> 
> Download the etax2004 executable.
> not so bad, apart from the fact that I had to pretend to the ATO that I 
> was using Internet Explorer. Funnily, they have a secure site test to 
> see if your browser supports SSL, but then the next page takes a peek at 
> your user agent string, if your user agent does not say Internet 
> explorer 5+, you're given a page of links as to where you can download 
> Microsoft security updates. I have no use for those whatsoever. ;)
> 
> A cool thing though, they advise mac users to use a windows emulator.
> Strange that they don't suggest this for Linux, perhaps this is for the 
> lack of IE for Linux. I guess that you COULD run it under wine, but why?
> 
> 
> Once I downloaded the executable... I double clicked it..
> I was prompted what I wished to run this file with.. to which I typed wine
> 
> Presto. The WISE installation wizard came up. I installed to my newly 
> created c:\
> Wine creates a directory in your home directory called .wine. within 
> this exists another directory called dosdevices. This contains folders 
> and symbolic links to directories and devices.
> this is where the folder c: is located.
> 
> The wise installer created a directory c:\etax2004\
> I navigated to this directory, found the executable etax2004.exe, double 
> clicked it, and chose wine again.
> 
> It worked.. smoothly. :)
> I was greeted with an ATO screen and subsequently ended up at the point 
> of being able to proceed with my tax return.
> 
> The first things that I noticed were not working, was all of the 
> contextual help hyper links.
> I presume that they're meant to fire up Microsoft's help browser, and 
> likewise, I didn't have any joy with the help feature itself.
> 
> Resizing the window seemed to take a bit of time for etax to catch up, 
> it seemed to refresh after I clicked on a back or next buttons.
> 
> Progressing through your tax return..
> Buttons seem to work properly, It doesn't have any problem adding or 
> subtracting. the mechanics of the program seem to work well.
> Sometimes in a numeric input field, it seems to not display the numbers, 
> I clicked off of those fields and back into them, re-entered the numbers 
> and all seemed fine.
> 
> Submission::
> I'm not sure as yet. I haven't tried testing that functionality. I need 
> to clarify a few more things before I submit it. I'll keep you if I make 
> any progress with this.
> 
> The program seemed as simple to use as it was when I last did my tax 
> return on a windows system. Contextual help would've been nice, but even 
> considering this lack, I was pleasantly surprised as to how quick and 
> easy this whole process was.
> 
> 
> if you've any questions, feel free to bash out a query to myself.

Hi Julian,

You will find that the last step of etax, submission, fails. Still, the
rest of it is functional enough. You will just have to complete the
return on a 'doze box for now.

Regards
Michael Collard