Visual Studio (Not VS Code), C# is fantastic these days cross-platform wise and a pretty solid general language

But the non-ms IDEs for it...are lacking...and MS just terminated MacOS support for VS (Not that it really mattered the macOS version was a bastardized version of VS anyways) so I don't think their flagship is coming (officially) to Linux anytime soon.

excel for vba support

WSL2 is pretty good. j/k

!boinc@sopuli.xyz if I am donating GPU power to science research. There is a BOINC client for Linux but packaging is a hot mess (though getting better) and compatibility with graphics drivers is hit-or-miss. So any crunching rigs I have w/ GPUs all run Windows.

Family tree maker. https://www.mackiev.com/ftm/

I run Scrivener, which is a writing software that's only for Mac & Windows (well, there is a Linux version but it's ancient), but I just run that through Wine rather than a VM. That's about the only thing I haven't found a good equivalent for on Linux though.

Anyone using ReactOS for this?

Yeah. I use quite a few windows exclusive programs. I know it is a long list but can't be helped. Good support and stability beats ideology and these apps provide me that. Here is the list:

I hope this list is helpful to others as well ☺️

There are some programs I still use that are designed for Windows, but use cases are "niche" or at very least specialized:

1. Guitar Pro 8 - Guitar Tab software

2. Line 6 HX Edit - Helix Settings Editor

3. Line 6 Powercab Edit - Amp Settings Editoe

4. Line 6 Updater - Firmware Updater for Line 6 Products

5. Steelseries GG - Configuration Software for Steelseries Peripherals

6. Numerous VSTs and other Audio Plugins

These are just what I remember I use off the top of my head.

I do use Guitar Pro 8 with Wine, but the others won't work through Wine. I did try to use the others with a Windows KVM through QEMU but I ultimately gave up and left one windows workstation because of my issues with my Nvidia RTX 3090.

non-game, non-niche

Nope, that's actually strictly my reason for having a dedicated Windows rig. Games, and niche homebrew apps.

Adobe Lightroom Classic. I have darktable installed on Linux, but I haven't mastered it yet. Lightroom is the software for photo editing, unfortuntately.

I have a Windows VM that runs Visual Studio and a small number of developer tools so I can test my code on Windows. And another windows VM that runs Daz3D, Clip Studio Paint and the Epic Launcher (to download stuff from the Unreal Engine Marketplace).

Sometimes I misuse either VM by creating a snapshot and installing Garmin Connect so I can update the music library on my watch :)

Nope.

I use an old copy of Photoshop CS5 via VMWare and Windows 10 installed in it. Unfortunately the Gimp doesn't have adjustment layers and the Selective Color feature. I can't live without these two features, I need them on each and every scan of my paintings to fix colors.

notepad++ with textfx edit, textfx tools, and hex editor. I've tried a lot of other things and it is still my favorite.
I don't actually use it for coding, but I often have to futz with files received from customers/QA or test data that I create.

I have mac for work and have been mostly hating BBedit. I keep meaning to try Cate and I guess the folks that made Atom just released something new.

Edit: just remembered: I did try Cate but had really weird UI issues using any dark themes (menus, etc. all became unreadable) and gave up.

QFIL aka Qualcomm Flash Image Loader but only because the rooting of my XR headset (Lynx) https://lynx.miraheze.org/wiki/Rooting_Process relies on it.

I've done it successfully so now I understand a bit better how it works. I could try to use instead https://github.com/bkerler/edl which looks even more complete and reproducible.

MusicBee, Stardock Fences, obligatory Adobe mention, all VR everything (unless something has changed recently, I haven't looked in while).

Not currently running a VM or anything, but I might need to set one up for iTunes and Garmin stuff.

I haven't been able to get Vectric Aspire to work yet, even under wine. It's used to layout tool paths for CNC operations, so it may be a little on the niche side, but it's pretty popular there.

Gamepass