Installation/Tutorial

Windows

1. Download the latest version of Railway Operation Simulator here.

2. Unzip the downloaded file.

3. Copy the Railway folder to somewhere safe.

4. You can run ROS using railway.exe in the Railway folder.

See here for a summary of files involved in RailOS.

Chocolatey Package Manager

As of v2.14 Railway Operation Simulator can be installed using the Chocolatey package manager.

choco install railwayopsim

Troubleshooting

When launching RailOS an error may be thrown regarding write access to the program directory. If this is the case you will need to edit permissions by right clicking on the directory C:/Program Files/Railway_Operation_Simulator, selecting properties, navigating to the Security tab and setting write permissions for the current user.

Mac and Linux

Mac and Linux instructions are provided by Krizar.

PLEASE BE AWARE: Railway Operation Simulator is NOT a native MAC and/or Linux app. Although you CAN get it to work this is by NO MEANS a certainty it will work on YOUR system.

WARNING: Apple has released a new OS that only supports native 64bit applications. As such, with the release of “Catalina” (OS 10.15) and “Big Sur” (OS 11) the below instructions will no longer work. If you have “Mojave” (OS 10.14 or earlier) you can still run the program as instructed below, however as soon as you upgrade to the newer versions (>= OS 10.15) you are no longer able to run RailwayOS.

Parallels™ Desktop

When you are using Parallels™ Desktop on your MAC, you have an actual version of Windows running on your Mac.

Switch to Windows instance and you can play it as if you are using any other Windows Program.

Wine on Mac

1. Install Homebrew package manager

Wine is installed within the terminal using the homebrew package manager available at https//brew.sh. Follow the installation instructions on the website to install it.

2. Install XQuartz >= 2.7.7.

This is required to use the X Window System used by Wine and can be downloaded here: https://www.xquartz.org/

3. Install Wine

Use brew to then install wine, open a terminal and enter:

$ sudo brew install wine

entering your password when prompted to do so.

4. Download Railway Operation Simulator

Download the Railway Operation Simulator software and unpackage the application somewhere accessible (e.g. the ‘Applications’ folder). Rename the unpackaged folder to ‘RailwayOperationSimulator’.

5. Launch the Application

To launch the application, go to the ‘Railway/railway.exe’ within the Railway Operation Simulator folder, right click the ‘railway.exe’ file and select ‘Copy “railway.exe”’.

Open a terminal and enter ‘wine’ and then paste the copied address, e.g. for the example where the application is located in the Applications folder, the command entered into the terminal would be:

$ wine /Users/username/Applications/RailwayOperationSimulator/Railway/railway.exe

this should launch the application within wine.

Wine Under Linux

To install under Fedora/Ubuntu

1. Update the repositories list

Open a terminal and update the repositories lists:

Fedora:

$ sudo yum update

Ubuntu:

$ sudo apt update

2. Install wine

Install the application

Fedora:

$ sudo yum install wine

Ubuntu:

$ sudo apt install wine

3. Download Railway Operation Simulator

Download the Railway Operation Simulator software and unpackage the application somewhere accessible (e.g. the users home folder). Rename the unpackaged folder to ‘RailwayOperationSimulator’.

4. Launch the Application

To launch the application, go to the ‘Railway/railway.exe’ within the Railway Operation Simulator folder, right click the ‘railway.exe’ file and select ‘Copy “railway.exe”’.

Open a terminal and enter ‘wine’ and then paste the copied address, e.g. for the example where the application is located in the Home folder, the command entered into the terminal would be:

$ wine $HOME/RailwayOperationSimulator/Railway/railway.exe

this should launch the application within wine.

[Mac Alternative] Installing Wine via Download/Creating a Mac App using Wine Bottler

If you wish to install Wine without creating an application you need only follow steps 1, 2, option 1 from step 8.

It is possible to create a .app application using Wine Bottler.

1. Download the latest release of Railway Operation Simulator to an accessible location, this location must have user write access. Rename the folder to ‘RailwayOperationSimulator’.
2. Download WineBottler from https://winebottler.kronenberg.org
3. Copy the WineBottler App over to the Applications folder as instructed
4. Launch WineBottler and click the ‘Advanced’ tab.
5. Under ‘Program Installation’ press the ‘select File…’ button and browse for the downloaded Railway Operation Simulator program folder, and then locate the executable ‘Railway/railway.exe’
6. Under ‘Installation Mode’ select ‘copy file (Program) and all files in the folder to the App Bundle’
7. Set ‘System Version Info’ to ‘7’
8. Decide whether to install Wine.app or package it within the RailwayOperationSimulator App:
   1. You can now either install ‘Wine.app’ from the downloaded ‘Wine Bottler’ drive, this will mean a railway operation smaller application and allow you to use Wine with other apps
   2. If you wish the Railway Operation Simulator App to behave as a free standing application you can instead within the configuration tick the box ‘Include Wine.app, so the user doesn’t have to install it’.
9. Set ‘Version’ to be the version of the Railway Operation Simulator release.
10. Click Install. This should create an application ‘RailwayOperationSimulator.app’ which can be launched.

This will package a copy of Wine.app within the application which will automatically be launched at the same time.

NOTE: Your choice at point 8 will either result in a single application ~700MB in size, or a two separate applications with the equivalent disk usage.