Innosetup binary for 21.5.34 cannot be downloaded

[Vin Shelton]

There is an error downloading. It seems to be permission issue. Please take a look.

Yes. That was just to see if anyone was paying attention. :-)

I have fixed the permissions.

Good luck!

- Vin

[Vin Shelton]

Dear Biswajit,

I hope you didn't have to struggle too much.

Mostly it involved cleaning out some cobwebs from my mind, but I did
run into one actual issue: the new Cygwin texinfo, 5.x, doesn't
include a makeinfo.exe, so I couldn't generate the .info files from
DOS. Also, the .texi files were not compatible with texinfo 5.x, so I
had to build texinfo 4.13a and use that for generating the .info
files.

Have you also updated (and corrected) the instructions for building a native
windows binary (at least the steps you followed) ?

Well, my scripts worked for me (modulo that texinfo issue I
mentioned), so why don't you tell me what troubles you ran into?

Lastly, would it be possible to make it a more standard practice to keep the
innosetup binaries up-to-date with the source releases (on the beta channel
as well, not just the stable channel) ?

This is doubtful, for me at least. I don't work much under Windows
any more. I will probably keep my XP virtual machine in the freezer,
though, so the possibility exists that I will be able to make setup
kits for future releases. As I mentioned in another email, the path
to reliably building native setup kits for XEmacs under Windows
probably passes through upgrading the Windows build machinery to use a
free version of VS 2010 or 2013 (or more ambitiously - and therefore
more excitingly - some flavor of mingw).

- Vin

[Vin Shelton]

Dear XEmacs Developers,

I recently got a large roundtuit dropped in my lap (my startup company
imploded), so I've spent a few days working on XEmacs native Windows
setup kits.

I was assuming that the stable channel native windows binary will be built
by "someone".... If that assumption is right, then the same "someone" could
build the beta channel native windows binary. It may not be you,
necessarily.

Your assumption is correct, but I am the only someone who builds these
kits. I will try to make a setup kit for every release, but it is
difficult for me to know how much time I will have for making setup
kits in between releases.

However, if that assumption is wrong, I would like you to know that a heck
of a lot of people use xemacs on Windows - maybe you underestimate the
number of such people.

Dear Biswajit - thank you for your kind words. They certainly made me
feel like my efforts in this area have been well worthwhile.

I have re-made setup kits for 21.4.22, 21.5.34 and 21.4 latest and
21.5 latest. I will upload them this afternoon to ftp.xemacs.org.

I will be sending a small patch to XEmacs-patches to work around a
couple of difficulties building without TLS on native Windows. I have
not attempted to build with TLS as of yet.

- Vin

[Vin Shelton]

Biswajit -

Does http://ftp.xemacs.org/pub/windows/testing/XEmacs_Setup_21.5.34.exe
(or http://ftp.xemacs.org/pub/windows/testing/XEmacs_Setup_21.5-2015-05-18.exe)
work for you?

The instructions (based on the non-free Visual Studio 6 - what're you
staring at? It was released in 1998!) work for me. If someone wants
to update the instructions, patches will be reviewed and approved. :-)

Regards,
Vin

Vin had made an experimental 21.5.34 innosetup build for me, back in 2014.
I have been using it since. I have not seen any issues yet, other than that
paren-highlighting does not seem to work.
Would it be possible to fix this, and release an official 21.5.34 beta
innosetup build ?
There was one more request from me at the time - to dust off the build
instructions for a native X86 build using free tools (including free
versions of Microsoft tools), so that people can download and build binaries
easily. May I raise the same request again ?
Thanks a lot.
-Biswajit
________________________________
Sent: Thursday, November 6, 2014 11:44 AM
Subject: Re: Innosetup binaries for 21.5.32 and later
Dear XEmacs Developers,
I recently got a large roundtuit dropped in my lap (my startup company
imploded), so I've spent a few days working on XEmacs native Windows
setup kits.

I was assuming that the stable channel native windows binary will be built
by "someone".... If that assumption is right, then the same "someone" could
build the beta channel native windows binary. It may not be you,
necessarily.

Your assumption is correct, but I am the only someone who builds these
kits. I will try to make a setup kit for every release, but it is
difficult for me to know how much time I will have for making setup
kits in between releases.

However, if that assumption is wrong, I would like you to know that a heck
of a lot of people use xemacs on Windows - maybe you underestimate the
number of such people.

Dear Biswajit - thank you for your kind words. They certainly made me
feel like my efforts in this area have been well worthwhile.
I have re-made setup kits for 21.4.22, 21.5.34 and 21.4 latest and
21.5 latest. I will upload them this afternoon to ftp.xemacs.org.
I will be sending a small patch to XEmacs-patches to work around a
couple of difficulties building without TLS on native Windows. I have
not attempted to build with TLS as of yet.
- Vin

[Biswajit Khandai]

Thanks, Vin. Here is what I find.
1. Paren-highlighting does not work in the various flavors of 21.5.34 .
2. Paren-highlighting works fine in 21.5.29. 
Exactly where should I get the build instructions for native X86 binary ? Can these build instructions be ported to a more recent VS version ?
BTW, I just learned that "Visual Studio Community 2013" is a full-featured visual studio that is made available FREE by Microsoft starting Nov 2014.
Visual Studio Community 2013

|   |
|   | |   |   |   |   |   |
| 2014-Nov 12 Release Notes | Visual StudioVisual Studio Community 2013 November 12, 2014 Visual Studio Co... |
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| View on www.visualstudio.com | Preview by Yahoo |
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|   |



Can the native binary build process be ported to VS Community 2013 ? I am willing to help, if I can be of any help. For example, if you can give me a set of reasonable build instructions, I can try to run through it and report any problems back to you to clean up the process.
Thanks,Biswajit
From: Vin Shelton <***@xemacs.org>
To: Biswajit Khandai <***@yahoo.com>
Cc: XEmacs developers <xemacs-***@xemacs.org>
Sent: Thursday, May 28, 2015 11:27 AM
Subject: Re: Innosetup binaries for 21.5.32 and later

Biswajit -

Does http://ftp.xemacs.org/pub/windows/testing/XEmacs_Setup_21.5.34.exe
(or http://ftp.xemacs.org/pub/windows/testing/XEmacs_Setup_21.5-2015-05-18.exe)
work for you?

The instructions (based on the non-free Visual Studio 6 - what're you
staring at?  It was released in 1998!) work for me.  If someone wants
to update the instructions, patches will be reviewed and approved. :-)

Regards,
  Vin

Vin had made an experimental 21.5.34 innosetup build for me, back in 2014.
I have been using it since. I have not seen any issues yet, other than that
paren-highlighting does not seem to work.
Would it be possible to fix this, and release an official 21.5.34 beta
innosetup build ?
There was one more request from me at the time - to dust off the build
instructions for a native X86 build using free tools (including free
versions of Microsoft tools), so that people can download and build binaries
easily. May I raise the same request again ?
Thanks a lot.
-Biswajit
________________________________
Sent: Thursday, November 6, 2014 11:44 AM
Subject: Re: Innosetup binaries for 21.5.32 and later
Dear XEmacs Developers,
I recently got a large roundtuit dropped in my lap (my startup company
imploded), so I've spent a few days working on XEmacs native Windows
setup kits.

I was assuming that the stable channel native windows binary will be built
by "someone".... If that assumption is right, then the same "someone" could
build the beta channel native windows binary. It may not be you,
necessarily.

Your assumption is correct, but I am the only someone who builds these
kits.  I will try to make a setup kit for every release, but it is
difficult for me to know how much time I will have for making setup
kits in between releases.

However, if that assumption is wrong, I would like you to know that a heck
of a lot of people use xemacs on Windows - maybe you underestimate the
number of such people.

Dear Biswajit - thank you for your kind words.  They certainly made me
feel like my efforts in this area have been well worthwhile.
I have re-made setup kits for 21.4.22, 21.5.34 and 21.4 latest and
21.5 latest.  I will upload them this afternoon to ftp.xemacs.org.
I will be sending a small patch to XEmacs-patches to work around a
couple of difficulties building without TLS on native Windows.  I have
not attempted to build with TLS as of yet.
  - Vin

[Vin Shelton]

Biswajit -

Not to be too thick, but what is paren-highlighting supposed to do? I
haven't used it for a long time. How did you turn it on?

The standard approach for reporting bugs is:

1. This is what I did. It's always best to start from some known
minimal place, like "xemacs -vanilla".
2. This is what I expected. E.g. When I opened this file and moved my
cursor to the first curly brace, I expected the curly brace to change
into a dancing hippo.
3. This is what I got. E.g. The curly brace didn't change

When you wrote: "the build fail very quickly" what does that mean?
Did you try to use VS6? See the 3 simple steps above.

- Vin

[Vin Shelton]

Dear Biswajit,

Thanks for your efforts. Manifest files are one of the annoyance of
updating to a newer version of VS.

Good luck, and please keep xemacs-beta informed of your progress.

- Vin

Vin,
I tried to build a native binary using VS Community 2013. The
underlying VS is the 2012 version.
First I ran into the problem of mismatching versions of optional libs. The
config.inc was expecting different versions from the versions installed by
optional_libs.exe . I changed the versions in config.inc ,. That was easy.
Next I started running into real problems.
I see two kinds of errors. One kind is to do with missing manifest files.
Another kind has to do with keywords being used in macros (or something like
that).
Doing some Googling, I saw that adding a pragma (as follows) may help with
the second kind of error, I added the following pragma to config.h.in
(around line # 899) but it didn't seem to help really.
#pragma warning (1 : 4005)
Anyways, here is the log file from the build attempt.
-Biswajit

[Vin Shelton]

Dear Biswajit,

Vin,
This is where my original comment of "the build will fail in a heartbeat" had come from.
I thought this time around you or someone might work with me if I wanted to give it an initial spin. Is that (or not) the case ?
I wonder : Is xemacs still a serious and live project ? If it is, is Window native binary considered a serious enough part of the project ?

(I've copied xemacs-beta as that is the medium for communication among
the XEmacs developers and maybe someone else will want to chime in.)

I don't really understand your points; I'll explain the situation as I see it:

1. I am currently making Windows installation kits. Those kits are
built with VS6. The Windows Installation kits, at least in part
thanks to your prodding/encouragement, are an ongoing activity. I
generally create a new installation kit with each update to the 21.5
development branch.

2. If someone else wants to build Windows Installation kits using a
different version of Visual Studio (or a different toolchain
altogether), he or she is welcome to work through the issues
necessary. I am happy to advise/help in that effort, but I do not
currently have a copy of VS2012 or VS2013, so my advise will be
somewhat theoretical in nature. You (or whoever else wants to take
this on) will have to roll up your sleeves and struggle with various
issues (manifest files among them).

Whether or not XEmacs is serious and alive, is, IMO, in the eye of the beholder.

Thanks for the bug report on paren highlighting. Since you narrowed
the failure down to the menu, I will take a look at that.

- Vin

[Mats Lidell]

Post by Vin Shelton
(I've copied xemacs-beta as that is the medium for communication among
the XEmacs developers and maybe someone else will want to chime in.)

I have at occasions been playing with VS and XEmacs. Unfortunately a halfhearted attempt in that it never got my focus enough to push it into the repo. I've been thinking of installing a VS again and if there are patches up for test I could try them out.

The latest show stoppers for me in this respect is that the latest VS won't install on my good old faithful XP virtual machine that I run at home. Maybe I need to upgrade Windows version for other reasons soon and that will make it easier for me to contribute in this area.

Yours