Installing 32-bit Scrivener on 64-bit Linux Mint

I was and am new to linux so I couldn’t exactly follow the instructions on installing Scrivener onto Ubuntu/Kubuntu (figuring out what code to change). I found these instructions helpful for installing from a deb file: http://community.linuxmint.com/tutorial/view/370 with the relevant code posted right below.

To get a 32-bit library (this takes a few minutes since it was a 277mb download for me):

sudo apt-get install ia32-libs

Here you just change the directory to the location of your deb file. I actually just right-clicked on the deb file and selected “open in terminal”:

 cd 'Folder Location'

Then you force linux to put Scrivener in its own 32-bit environment. I’m posting the original but that didn’t work for me. I had to use code from a user-comment which is posted below the original.

Original (which didn’t work for me):

sudo dpkg -i - -force-architecture package.deb

What worked for me:

su -c "dpkg -i --force-architecture package.deb" 

Thanks to LizardGamer and JohnnyCross from Community.Linux.Mint.com

Thanks, Dingiswayo, this was definitely the answer for me - reinstalling the deb file dpkg using the parameter --force-architecture.

Big thanks for this help. Now I can get on with seeing how well Scrivener on linux matches the Mac version, since I’m thinking of leaving the Mac world, even though it functions better in most things than any other opsys. But it doesn’t cut it on wifi. (Something to do with a particular translation of the 801.11n rules.)

I’m one of those 80% of people who use 20% or less of a program’s functionality, so I’m hopeful that even a “buggy” beta on linux will be stable in all that I do make use of! Seems so thus far. No bugs at all as far as I can see.