How To Fix “Wine Won’t Install: Does Not Have Valid Release File” Error on Ubuntu 18.04

If you’re an Ubuntu 18.04 user who is trying to install Wine and encountering the “Wine Won’t Install: Does Not Have Valid Release File” error, this article will guide you through the process of troubleshooting and resolving the issue.

Understanding the Problem

The error message “Wine Won’t Install: Does Not Have Valid Release File” typically indicates that the Wine repository you’re trying to add does not have a valid release file for Ubuntu 18.04. This can occur if the repository has not been updated to support the new release.

Solution 1: Installing Wine from Ubuntu Repositories

One possible solution is to install the Wine package available in the Ubuntu repositories. Although this might not be the latest version of Wine, it is still a viable solution.

To install Wine from the Ubuntu repositories, open your terminal and run the following command:

sudo apt install wine

In this command, sudo allows you to run commands with administrative privileges, apt is the package handling utility in Ubuntu, and install is the command to install a package. wine is the name of the package you want to install.

Solution 2: Waiting for WineHQ Repository Updates

If you prefer to use the latest version of Wine, another solution is to wait for the WineHQ repositories to catch up with the new release. Once they have updated their repositories, you can follow the instructions provided on the WineHQ website to install Wine from their repositories.

Removing Previous Wine Installations

If you’ve previously installed a Wine package from another repository, it’s recommended to remove it and any packages that depend on it before attempting to install the WineHQ packages. This is to avoid potential dependency conflicts.

To remove the old installation, you can use a package manager like Synaptic or run the following command in terminal:

sudo apt remove wine

In this command, remove is used to uninstall a package.

After removing the old installation, you should also delete the .wine directory in your home folder. This can be done by running the following command:

rm -r ~/.wine

In this command, rm is used to remove files or directories, -r is used to remove directories and their contents recursively, and ~/.wine is the path to the directory you want to remove.

Checking for Leftover Entries

After removing the old installation, there might still be leftover entries in the menu or other locations. You can check the .local/share/applications directory for any wine-related entries and remove them manually.

To do this, navigate to the directory by running the following command:

cd ~/.local/share/applications

Then, list all the files in the directory with:

ls

If you see any wine-related entries, you can remove them with the rm command.

Conclusion

While the “Wine Won’t Install: Does Not Have Valid Release File” error can be frustrating, it’s usually due to the WineHQ repository not yet having official support for Ubuntu 18.04. In the meantime, you can either use the Wine package available in the Ubuntu repositories or wait for the WineHQ repository to be updated. By following the steps outlined in this article, you should be able to resolve the issue and successfully install Wine on your Ubuntu 18.04 system.