Windows 98/ME (ANSI) compile support needed again

[anonymous]

I took a poll of my users: about slightly less than 1/2 of the users of my software are wanting windows 98/ME support. A lot of these may be business users and home users. large-format printers seem to work best with old OS's...
etc. so sometimes users can't upgrade to windows 7, xp, or whatever.

please make ANSI code generation a possibility again. thank you.

support for ANSI got dropped, and it shouldn't have. it needs to come back in.

I don't want to deal with that older compiler version, it doesn't have features I need, plus about 30 of my programs have now been updated to reflect the new syntax and libraries.
thank you.

honestly, I don't know whether this is a bug or a feature request. reporting as bug.

[TicketCleanup]

Automatic ticket cleanup.

[Valik]

No. AutoIt is now a UNICODE application. Most of the ANSI conditional stuff is gone. There are also features that would have to be conditionally removed so the binary would even run on Windows 9x. This makes the code a huge mess just to cater to a small subset of potential users. It's not worth the time or effort to maintain. Tell your users to use an operating system that isn't older than their children or stop using a computer entirely.

[jmichae3@…]

I don't know about you, but I like serving my users with applications they can use. they are my customers. If they are still using windows 9x, fine with me, I will try my best to make my apps work on windows 9x. no need to cop an attitude here. I guess I need to start investigating GUI toolkits to replace autoit. thank you for your time.

[Jos]

Replying to jmichae3@…:

If they are still using windows 9x, fine with me, I will try my best to make my apps work on windows 9x.

What is the issue with using the latest version of Autoit3 that still supports ANSI? It is like Win9X not developed anymore but can still be used fine.

Jos

[jmichae3@…]

I admit I was upset by what you had said, and I shouldn't have said what I said, and I am sorry. I heard that the digital mars C++ compiler has some sort of microsoft MSLU unicode layer for unicode on top of windows 9x systems.
​http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/goglobal/bb688166

the the unicows.exe MSLU itself which is about 300KB
​http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/confirmation.aspx?id=4237

this provides a UNICODE layer on top of windows 9x/me. so this may mean you can keep the unicode stuff while still running. all you would need to do is tell the users they need to execute this program in their installers if it's a windows 9x/me machine. this requires OS detection. I have code for doing this in NSIS, but not innosetup.

I am going to do some testing to see if this works. I hope it does, if my ISP will work today.

as I said before, the older version of autoit is a different language (at least different libs), and I have already converted my code to the new version. I don't really want to go backwards because I like/need the new features in some cases.

[anonymous]

can't seem to get that unicows to do what I want it to. has no instructions, it just asks you where to dump 2 files (.dll and .pdb). not user friendly to average joe user or to developer. kb article has no instructions either. I guess you are supposed to program against it by dynamically loading the DLL. the license is miles long but it is a redistributable, as long as you distribute it properly with your app.

[anonymous]

does the older version work on vista/windows 7/windows 8 in the program files directory, which is a protected directory?
this is also a need. cross-platform in an ANSI version. I may need to go back to an ANSI version if this will work (I have no 7 boxed to test with).

you can have an XML manifest windows resource in an executable to make it vista/7/8 compatible with certain conditions: it must not have an assembly version, type, processorArchitecture, name. no description. trustinfo looks different. it looks basically like this (someprogram.exe.manifest):

<assembly xmlns="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:asm.v1" manifestVersion="1.0">

<ms_asmv2:trustInfo xmlns:ms_asmv2="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:asm.v2">

<ms_asmv2:security>

<ms_asmv2:requestedPrivileges>

<ms_asmv2:requestedExecutionLevel level="asInvoker">
</ms_asmv2:requestedExecutionLevel>

</ms_asmv2:requestedPrivileges>

</ms_asmv2:security>

</ms_asmv2:trustInfo>

</assembly>

this you link into the executable as a windows resource (or you use the microsoft mt.exe manifest tool).
the .rc file looks like this:

#include "winuser.h"
1 RT_MANIFEST "someprogram.exe.manifest"

this works with windows 98, xp, vista, 7, and probably 8 and allows the program to run in c:\program files\ without getting shoved into the Virtual Store.

[Jos]

Replying to jmichae3@…:

I admit I was upset by what you had said, and I shouldn't have said what I said, and I am sorry.

Don't know whether you noticed but I don't think you were upset with me.
Let's stop this dialog here and have that in our forum where this belongs.

Regards,
Jos