[Christianb]

Hi Gang,
I have quick and easy question for someone with Windows 95a, not gold, b, or c, but Windows 95a. Also know as Windows 95 SP1. Please send me the value from
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\CurrentVersion
in the registry.
Thank you one trillion and one to whomever sends me the value. I really appreciate it,
Christian Blackburn

You'll be helping the InnoSetup Installer which is an open source installer for Win32 that I'm very proud to be a part of.

[Lotus]

Quote:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\CurrentVersion

We still have a couple older systems with Win95a on them but the value you want doesn't exist on them. Are you sure it is the current version under windows NT? Just wanted to check, because I have no listing for windows nt in that area. Was it a miss-type?

[Christianb]

Hi Thanks for trying, I'm sorry that key wasn't there I really had no idea where it would be. It could be at HKLM\Software\Micorosoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Setup, but actually if I could probably get the info I need by just writing down the version info Windows + Pause reveals.

I've marked in red the information I'm trying to find out. What is Windows 95A called? What is the 4.X.X verison? and What does it list the service pack as, Service Release 1?
Thanks again for checking,
Christian

[Lotus]

Here is what you are asking for then (from the system properties screen)


Microsoft Windows 95
4.00.950a
IE 4.0.4.72.2106.8


Hope that helps somewhat. There is nothing listed for service pack, other than the a, b, c at the end of the windows version number.

[adamvjackson]

Testing my memory, I believe when SP1 was applied to a new retail 95 install, it would read 95A, FYI.

[Lotus]

Yeah thats what I meant =)

[Christianb]

Thank you very much for your help Lotus and Adamjackson.
-Christian

[Christianb]

Yes InnoSetup is the bomb .
-Christian

[Christianb]

Hi AlecStaar,
Good for you shareware man . You do get a cape with that by the way . Just about anything, and I do mean anything, you can do with a batch file you can do better with a industry level installer like InnoSetup. Hell even microsoft hid an InnoSetup Installer recently inside of .msi(WIndows Installer Package), because it's just too easy, smaller, and faster . It was in one of their Outlook Express stationary installers I believe. There might be a screenshot to it on Jordan Russel's (the author's) website. Anways unless you're utilizing reg.exe you should never be creating an installer from a batch file. The reason being that I can install my system folder at
C:\System\
and my desktop at
C:\Stupid Desktop Icons\
and my Documents and Settings Folder
at X:\The moon\. If you use InnoSetup their are intrinsic constants for each of these key folders
if you read the help file you can read all of them ISetup.zip
, but they look like this:
You would install your .exe to "{pf}\My Nifty Program". YOu might put a shortcut aT {UserFavorites}\Links for your program. Okay I just read all three batches. Not only will InnoSetup look more proffessional, but it'll install to the right folders every time, quite unlike your batch file. InnoSetup will also provide error messages if it fails to register an OCX. Simply put it's a gillion times better than what you've got. Although batch files are cool . I have never used v3.0 which finally left beta on the 16th of this month. I probably won't use it for a while longer. If you can hurry you can still download a tried and true stable version of 2.0. Also if you do make an installer be sure to go the website and join the newsgroup so you can get help when you need it. Also if you want to sent me a registration number for my time, that'd be a nice gesture .
Good Luck Amigo,
Christian

[Christianb]

Sorry I forgot to post the helpfile earlier. If you look at my preview post their is now a hypelink in there. Also what language did you write your main application in?
Thanks,
Christian

[Christianb]

Hi Alec,
Good grief that was a long reply . Oh well so was my post .

Quote:

Except for size... they usually add on about 1-3 mb, which is why I went with batches for now... keeps it under 16mb, from its 13++ mb size now.

Actually InnoSetup is hella thin, it BZips the installation files and creates a Delphi (yes I like delphi too, it's hella cool, but I can't code in it for s h / t) installation package. I've never used a thinner installer. I imagine that the InnoSetup 3.0 packages are larger. I haven't used IS3 yet.
-Christian

[Christianb]

Hi Alec,
I am going to have to reply to these one at a time to keep it Manageable.

Quote:

Christianb wrote:
Anways unless you're utilizing reg.exe you should never be creating an installer from a batch file.

Quote:

AlecStaar wrote:
I am, in doing registrations of various .reg files... and some OLE server registrations (if that is another thing you meant, not doing regedit.exe or regedt32.exe but instead using regsvr32.exe etc.)

No I'm refering to getting these system folder paths from the registry using reg.exe which can be called from a batch file:
here's the registry settings you were asking about and I alluded to:

Code:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Folders]
"Common Start Menu"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\All Users\\Start Menu"
"Common Desktop"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\All Users\\Desktop"
"Common AppData"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\All Users\\Application Data"
"Common Programs"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\All Users\\Start Menu\\Programs"
"Common Documents"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\All Users\\Documents"
"Common Administrative Tools"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\All Users\\Start Menu\\Programs\\Administrative Tools"
"Common Startup"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\All Users\\Start Menu\\Programs\\Startup"
"Common Templates"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\All Users\\Templates"
"Personal"="D:\\"
"Common Favorites"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\All Users\\Favorites"

Now that you see how segmented these folders can be perhaps you'll understand exactly why you need to move to an installer ASAP 8) .
-Christian

[Christianb]

Woops! I forgot the user level folders too:
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

Code:

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Folders]
"AppData"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\Administrator\\Application Data"
"Cookies"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\Administrator\\Cookies"
"Desktop"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\Administrator\\Desktop"
"Favorites"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\Administrator\\Favorites"
"NetHood"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\Administrator\\NetHood"
"Personal"="D:\\"
"My Pictures"="D:\\My Pictures"
"PrintHood"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\Administrator\\PrintHood"
"Recent"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\Administrator\\Recent"
"SendTo"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\Administrator\\SendTo"
"Start Menu"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\Administrator\\Start Menu"
"Templates"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\Administrator\\Templates"
"Programs"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\Administrator\\Start Menu\\Programs"
"Startup"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\Administrator\\Start Menu\\Programs\\Startup"
"Local Settings"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\Administrator\\Local Settings"
"Local AppData"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\Administrator\\Local Settings\\Application Data"
"Cache"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\Administrator\\Local Settings\\Temporary Internet Files"
"History"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\Administrator\\Local Settings\\History"
"Fonts"="C:\\WINNT\\Fonts"
"Administrative Tools"="C:\\Documents and Settings\\Administrator\\Start Menu\\Programs\\Administrative Tools"

-Christian

[Christianb]

Hey Alec,
Technically speaking you could write a highly elaborate batch file that would capture these values with reg.exe and then variable-ize your batch based installation. InnoSetup to my knowledge detects every last one of these folders from the registry. If 2.0 doesn't then you can be sure it was updated in 3.0.
-Christian

[Christianb]

Ignore.

[Christianb]

Ignore.

[Christianb]

Quote:

Been looking for a GOOD one... this one looks pretty good, VERY "InstallShield" looking-like, & I always liked their installers!

Yes this is InstallShield like except you can probably do more with InstallShield. InstallShield is C based and InnoSetup is Pascal based. There is also a converter for IShield Express to InnoSetup so if you have one of those made you might want to look into it. Also I bet you could reduce your install package size substantially if you run depends on your VB.exe and figure out which of the runtime files your really need, VB is terrible about telling you that. Do you have VS 6 Enterprise I know it comes with depends?
-Christian

[Christianb]

About the OCX error handling, I'm not sure about that. I know registration is supported, but it may be supported via the [RUN] section in which case it wouldn't be any different than your batch file in that regards. However you should take a look at the 2.0 help file see if there's anything about it there. Also if you don't find it in the 2.019 help file then you could download v3.05 or ask in the InnoSetup Newsgroup.
Good Luck,
Christian

[Christianb]

Hi Alec,
By the way I didn't write InnoSetup or any part of it. I don't know Delphi so that would make things very difficult. Although it's like VB the syntax is enough different that I wouldn't be able to do it by myself without a considerable learning curve . Although one day I hope to take a class on it, because I've always wanted to know it and now that it finally supports multiple OS's (the two most popular anyways) I really want to know it. Personally I like MacOS better than Linux, but nobody really uses Macs anymore either (I never even owned one, but I used those of friend's , family, work, and school). The WinAMP installer is excellent, possibly better than InnoSetup, but InnoSetup is easier and get's higher ratings. There's also the Ghost Installer which is freeware like the other two. However only one of them won at the shareware 2002 personal choice awards: InnoSetup! I've used a lot of distribution methods self-extractors, VB 5's installer, InstallShield, VB6's Installer, and the Windows Installer and I definetly liked InnoSetup the best.
-Christian

[Christianb]

Well good luck to you on your final release Alec. You know you really ought to buy a domain for your product. For 8.95 at GoDaddy.com you could pick up APKTools.com or something like that and it'd come with free domain forwarding to whatever website you're application's home page is at.
Ciao Amigo,
Christian