OpenCPN Version 3.0.2 Release

[nohal]

dpons...
Lucky you Assuming all the bugs in XP were security and not stability related, you sure are even right. BTW if you still have VS2008 toolchain around, it's very simple to produce OpenCPN version compatible with W2k and XP with lower service packs. I simply don't have this toolchain available any more and to be honest miss the motivation to maintain one for the 2 (yes, two) users who had reported problems because of not meeting the system requirements in the forum since 3.0 was released. Volunteers willing to do so welcome

Pavel

[dpons]

Originally Posted by nohal

dpons...
Lucky you Assuming all the bugs in XP were security and not stability related, you sure are even right.

Fortunately, I just use it very seldom to test web apps using different browsers, running it from VirtualBox.

Last time I developed for windows was in 1998, I went nuts with the sh*tty tcp stack and vowed not to work again using MS products. So far I've been lucky. Now I'm going nuts with the continuous re-morphing of java and the deluge of APIs for it.

But I do think that we should not leave behind people using perfectly good machines with older OS software. Sometimes it just takes a little effort. IDEs are the big enemy there , they enforce compatibility with the the latest APIs

[sy_gilana]

Hi Pavel, Make that three. I have xpsp2 on a dell laptop. I cannot load SP3, have tried many times, and while looking for the answer to that question, found a forum that discussed the API of some (older) dell laptops and SP3...

So I would love to try OpenCPN 3.0 or 02, but need to buy a new laptop, or....I'm going to try that visual C++ redis...

Keep up the good work, but I do feel "left behind" and will do till I find a suitable 2nd hand laptop with ALL the ports on the back...

[nohal]

Originally Posted by sy_gilana

Hi Pavel, Make that three.

OK, adding you to the counter. Still the other one counting the people having problems with the older Microsoft runtime libraries not being able to be installed on Microsoft's own operating systems is considerably higher. Until there's someone who will be able and willing to maintain the old toolchain, build stuff, update the documentation and provide the needed support for the users, we simply don't have resources to do that. This is not rocket science, but it takes time which at least I don't have and to be honest is not too much fun for a developer who, surprisingly, usually enjoys doing something creative in his free time devoted to open source software...

Pavel

[bdbcat]

Pavel/Jesper...

Just so we all know the score, what is it about the current Windows version of O that requires SP3? Is it in the source, or is it a wxWidgets problem?

Dave

[nohal]

Dave...
The requirement is that of VC2010 redistributable. There's nothing in the WX or OpenCPN source that needs XP3.

Pavel

[HappySeagull]

...newer betas work fine for me on SP2.
I did have to fly through the fiery hoop of installing the VC2010 Redist .

[nohal]

OK, here's what the situation is and the options we have:

We distribute VS2010 redistributable SP1 - it needs XP SP3 and silently fails to install on anything older.

If we switch to vc_redist without SP1, we can relax the system requirements to XP SP2

If we stop using vc_redist.exe and start installing the needed DLLs (msvcr100.dll and msvcp100.dll should be enough I think) as part of our own installer into the application folder, I believe we should be good with any XP SP level (needs to be tested and confirmed, according to Redistributing Visual C++ Files there are no legal problems doing so. Supporting W2k requires serious tweaking on the target system - more info at Windows 2000 Gaming • View topic - Win2kgaming: Advanced Fix Guide

If we switch back to VS2008 as a build platform, we will get the same problems with the redistributable package failing to install on some system we've had before. Technically it can be solved by including just the needed DLLs in our setup package, but the licensing situation is way less clear - Redistributing Visual C++ Files does not explicitly allow this way to install the libraries and there's a lot of uncertainity about the legal aspects of not using the vc_redist installer when the application is built using Visual Studio 2008 Express.

Pavel

[bdbcat]

Pavel, et al...

I think we should not even consider moving back to VS2008. This would surely tie our hands some day in the future. VS2012 released this week...

So, we come to the notion of installing the runtime dlls in the "Program Files/OpenCPN folder as private dlls for O only. In principle this seems OK, but as you say would require lots of validation before release.

It quickly becomes a question of resources and priorities. We have limited developer bandwidth, and a whole bunch of new ideas in the hopper for the 3.2 Release.

Here's an idea: How about a detailed tutorial describing how an end-user might manually set up O to run with private dlls? Just a matter of getting the right dlls from MS, and placing them in the correct O directory. Maybe we would need to tweak the installer to skip the redist install step. At least it could provide a workable solution for the (growing) list of folks with SP3 problems.

Volunteers, anyone?

Dave

[HappySeagull]

I have the dlls msvcr100.dll and msvcp100.dll for the portable version.My question is: Don't these are have to be registered by using "regsvr msvcp100.dll" etc. -will that work? Because I've tried running O portably on someone else's laptop with XPsp1 and she wouldn't go...I'm guessing it's because the dlls weren't registered properly...?
I'll have to try it I guess so I have to flutter off and uninstall all the vcredists here...

[HappySeagull]

nah. O still works with 2010 and 2008 redists gone...she's got her own versions of those two files in her folder and right now, she's happy with just that. I can't fix what I can't break properly....I'll try a registry sweep.

[HappySeagull]

nope.Runs portably and not-portably...so it follows, assuming the people with trouble can fix it by dropping those two files into O's folder
... those two files just need a roost.
(By the way, I have noticed that just copying the O folder "portably" often leaves those two files behind! They won't be copied and pasted with all the other files! Maybe it's because they ARE "registered" ...? anybody else notice this? any lurkers reading this should double-check that.)

[HappySeagull]

these? so far so good but do yer own virus scan.
MSVCR100.dll Download or MSVCP100.dll Download | Rhyous
look in the applicable folder- "x86/Microsoft.VC100.CRT" for most.

added: they are slightly older versions.

[dpons]

Originally Posted by bdbcat

Pavel, et al...

I think we should not even consider moving back to VS2008.

Stupid question: are there other development environments that could be used in windows? Does stuff like Cygwin works? Being tied to VS would reproduce this issue every few years.

As I said a few posts back, I don't develop in windows so I have no clue.

[bdbcat]

dpons...

In my limited experience, cygwin is even more fragile than the MS dlls.
Many runtime dlls floating around, with unknown compatibility issues.
Of course, as with the proposal for MS, we could include the "correct" gygwin dlls with the OpenCPN distribution...

But why open another can of worms, although "HappySeagull" might like them...

For better or worse, MS has fairly tight version controls build into their dlls They simply won't even try to run something that doesn't match up almost exactly with what it was built against and for.

Dave