This question already has an answer here:
How do I avoid UAC when my EXE file name contains the word "update"?
(1 answer)
Closed 13 days ago.
I am currently developing an internal tool using Delphi.
If I call the project and therefore the .exe
RecUtil
It runs fine with no intervention. However if I name the project
RecUpdate
It requires user intervention to allow it to run.
This is a command line utility, the only thing that changes between compiles is the filename of the project and by extension of the .exe.
Essentially once I go over the 8.3 limit I get different behaviour on the same .exe.
Does Delphi compile an .exe differently based on the length of the filename?
I am using Delphi 10.4
If I rename the file after compilation everything is fine it works like normal.
The answer to this is entirely to do with the words in the .exe name and not the number of characters.
I was naming my .exe recipeUpdate.exe which seems to trigger this UAC issue.
I removed the word update and it works fine.
Related
Okay, I've been struggling with this for full last couple of hours. I have a Windows 7 32-bit installation, on which I'm trying to compile some old code. I do not have any working knowledge of VB, but I'm trying to build a VB6 project which is part of the code base. The code compiles and when I run it after full-compile, it runs. But I can't seem to find where this file is. Task manager shows VB6 as process. It is not present in %TEMP%, and not in my project directory. Running an exhaustive search on my single drive configuration, I can find only one entry by this name, and this file has a timestamp older than current time. I attempted delete on this one while the debugger was still on breakpoint and it succeeded. As last resort in prefetch directory, I deleted that entry also, but magically this file still runs when on VB6. What must have been going on?
When you run an application within the VB6 IDE, it entirely runs within the VB6 IDE. Unlike some other languages, it isn't creating an executable file and then running it separately while hooking a debugger up, it just starts running your code using the VB interpreter.
To create a standalone .exe file, you need to create it separately. In the "File" menu, choose "Make projectname.exe". For full details, see "Making and Running an Executable File" in the Visual Basic 6 Concepts guide.
This question already has answers here:
Closed 11 years ago.
Possible Duplicate:
How can you force VB6 to use the DLLs and OCXs from the app directory?
I have a small application and it references a DLL named chkConn.dll.
For example, I have two different versions of the dll in two different locations. The other one is C:\chkConn.dll and the other is D:\chkConn.dll. I want my application to use C:\chkConn.dll even if I register D:\chkConn.dll in my system.
I read about creating manifests,but, I'm not sure how to do it.
The easiest thing is to put the dll(s) you want to use into your application folder. Then create an empty text file ApplicationName.exe.local. The .local extension tells Windows to load dlls for the exe from that folder first. The interesting thing is the trick works for ActiveX DLLs also.
This question already has answers here:
How do I deploy Node.js applications as a single executable file? [duplicate]
(7 answers)
Closed 7 years ago.
Because Node.js now also available on Windows, I would like to share my scripts without including node.exe. Is it possible to pack the script (no more files) together with the node.exe into a single executable file?
You absolutely can, and it's pretty easy with JXcore.
Once you have JXcore installed on windows, all you have to do is run:
jx package app.js "myAppName" -native
This will produce a .exe file that you can distribute and can be executed without any external dependencies whatsoever (you don't even need JXcore nor Node.js on the system).
Here's the documentation on that functionality: https://github.com/jxcore/jxcore/blob/master/doc/api/jxcore-feature-packaging-code-protection.markdown
(Duplicate of https://stackoverflow.com/a/27551233/810830)
Have you tried WinRAR? It should give you the opportunity to create a self-extractable executable which unpacks all files to the TEMP folder. After doing this you can setup to run one exe file in the archive. Furthermore you can hide the "Unpack" dialog.
actually I think you can use adobe air to accomplish this, no need to include node.exe
have you ever tried to develop hybrid applications with QtWebKit, which I think might be a very good direction for you., hope this helps.
What is the difference between the a.bat, a.com and a.exe extensions?
Originally, a .COM file was a literal blob of 8086 code (that is, 16-bit x86). It is meant to be loaded at a fixed address, and the loader would jump straight to the first byte of its address. It's also limited in size.
An .EXE file has more header information. So it has required structures for things like dynamic linking, where code from a DLL can be patched into the .EXE's memory space at load time.. It originally comes from DOS, but it's today used in Windows.
However DOS and Windows eventually went to a model where the file extension in a .COM and .EXE didn't mean anything. The program loader first checks the first two bytes of the file. If it happens to be the string MZ (legend has it this stands for the initials of an early Microsoft employee), it will treat it as an EXE, otherwise it will load it as if it were a COM file. Since MZ doesn't map to a sensible x86 instruction to start a program, they can get away with this. Net effect: In some versions of DOS/Windows, an .EXE can be named with .COM and vice versa. For example, in many versions of DOS/Windows, the famous COMMAND.COM was actually an EXE.
I am not sure how much the previous paragraph applies to NT based versions of Windows. I'd imagine by now they've abandoned the .COM stuff altogether.
Lastly, a .BAT file is a list of commands to be executed as if you typed them at your command prompt. However these days most people name them as .CMD.
.bat is a batch file. It is interpreted.
.exe is a regular executable program file.
A .com file, at least for MS-DOS, has many meta-data missing and is loaded into a specific offset in the main memory. It is smaller than .exe
I assume you mean for Windows?
"a.bat" is supposed to be a batch file, the Windows/DOS equivalent of a script file.
"a.com" and "a.exe" are supposed to be equivalent these days. However, back in the Windows 3.x days, a "com" file was a DOS executable, where an "exe" file was a portable executable, or a Windows-based executable. This is a gotcha these days, as files in the format "www.example.com" can exist on your hard drive, and many people mistake such a file for a web link. Even worse, Windows typically tries executing "com" files before "exe" files.
A bat(ch) file is a script that is executed by the command interpretor.
A exe file is compiled binary code to be executed directly on the cpu.
A com file is a relic from the past to create a small exe.
.BAT - Batch File: list of commands (basically a text file with command-line commands)
.COM - DOS Executable loaded into a fixed block of memory (stems back from before multi-tasking)
.EXE - Executable file - standard application on the Windows platform
While EXE and BAT files often serve a similar purpose, they use completely different file formats. Both file types can be used for creating executable content in Windows, but BAT files are limited in the commands they can perform. Since BAT files contain human-readable text, they can be easily edited and therefore are often used for custom scripting tasks. EXE files, on the other hand, contain complex binary data that is built using a compiler. Since EXE files support more complex commands than BAT files, most Windows applications are saved in the EXE format.
I was also looking for the same query and found something that have pasted here.
Please refer the below link, you will find it useful, it perfectly answers your question:
Difference between .BAT and .EXE
Actually, .com and .exe are both binary executable files, whereas .bat is basically a batch file. Now suppose you have got many files with the same name, but different extensions.
For instance, a.com, a.exe and if you are running through the command prompt file a. It will first execute a.com (only if it exists), else it will run a.exe. Or say a.exe is also not there then it will look for a.bat execution.
A .BAT (short for "batch") file is a plain text file that contains a
series of Windows commands.
An .EXE (short for "executable") file is a binary file that contains
much more complex executable binary code.
A .COM file was a DOS executable and nowadays its same as .EXE.
.bat file effects directly on the performance of CPU.
While, the .exe file will be compiled by interpreter and then executed on CPU.
I have recently gone through a bunch of standalone utility apps written in VB6 to make sure that registry virtualization is turned off for Windows Vista and above. I created a standalone manifest file for each exe, set the requestedExecutionLevel appropriately (some of them need to modify HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE registry keys, others do not), and tested them. They all appear to work correctly.
I have only one small problem remaining. Since they are standalone utilities, people are used to just copying them around the network and running them manually. If anyone forgets to copy the manifest file as well as the exe, then the exe will silently write to the virtualized registry key instead of the real one and cause hard-to-debug problems.
The obvious solution is to embed the manifest into the exe as a resource. All the articles I have read on the net tell you to embed the resource like this:
#define CREATEPROCESS_MANIFEST_RESOURCE_ID 1
#define RT_MANIFEST 24
CREATEPROCESS_MANIFEST_RESOURCE_ID RT_MANIFEST "app.manifest"
This should work just fine, except that the VB compiler always creates the application icon with resource ID = 1. When I tried the above code, Windows refused to run the exe, complaining about a resource error (I'll update this post with the details later). I tried changing the resource ID to another number, after which Windows ran the program successfully but did not recognise the manifest contents.
Does anyone know of a way to get an embedded manifest to work in a VB6 exe, or should I just stick with an external file?
UPDATE 1
The text given above is the whole content of the .rc file. I compile it to a .res file like this:
"%ProgramFiles%\Microsoft Visual Studio\VB98\Wizards\rc.exe" /r /fo "Resources.res" "Resources.rc"
And embed it in the VB6 project file like this:
Type=Exe
Reference=*\G{00020430-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}#2.0#0#..\..\..\..\..\..\..\..\WINDOWS\system32\stdole2.tlb#OLE Automation
Form=Main.frm
ResFile32="Resources.res"
IconForm="FMain"
Startup="FMain"
HelpFile=""
Title="Windows Vista Registry Test - VB6"
ExeName32="RegistryTestVB6.exe"
Path32=""
Command32=""
Name="RegistryTestVB6"
HelpContextID="0"
CompatibleMode="0"
MajorVer=1
MinorVer=0
RevisionVer=0
AutoIncrementVer=0
ServerSupportFiles=0
VersionComments="Windows Vista Registry Test - VB6"
VersionCompanyName=""
VersionFileDescription="Windows Vista Registry Test - VB6"
VersionLegalCopyright=""
VersionProductName="Windows Vista Registry Test - VB6"
CondComp=""
CompilationType=0
OptimizationType=0
FavorPentiumPro(tm)=0
CodeViewDebugInfo=0
NoAliasing=0
BoundsCheck=0
OverflowCheck=0
FlPointCheck=0
FDIVCheck=0
UnroundedFP=0
StartMode=0
Unattended=0
Retained=0
ThreadPerObject=0
MaxNumberOfThreads=1
When I read the compiled exe into the VS2008 resource editor, it looks like this:
RegistryTestVB6.exe
Icon
1 [Neutral]
RT_MANIFEST
1 [English (United States)]
Version
1 [English (United States)]
When I construct an exact equivalent VB.NET test app in VS2008, then load that into the resource editor, it looks like this instead:
RegistryTestNET.exe
Icon
32512 [Neutral]
RT_MANIFEST
1 [Neutral]
Version
1 [Neutral]
UPDATE 2
Testing - the .NET exe runs fine on both Windows XP and Windows 7. However, the VB6 exe produces the following error on XP:
This application has failed to start because the application configuration is incorrect. Reinstalling the application may fix this problem.
and the following error on 7:
The application has failed to start because its side-by-side configuration is incorrect. Please see the application event log or use the command-line sxstrace.exe tool for more detail.
Looking in the event log I see the following entry:
Activation context generation failed for "RegistryTestVB6.exe". Error in manifest or policy file "RegistryTestVB6.exe" on line 10. Invalid Xml syntax.
Needless to say the XML isn't invalid, it's exactly the same file with the same encoding that I used for the .NET exe, and that one works.
RESOLUTION
The VB6 compiler does indeed require that an arbitrary text file included in a resource must be an exact multiple of 4 bytes. I simply added spaces to the XML until Notepad++ told me that the total file size including BOM was a multiple of 4.
Thanks to both Michael and Jim for pointing me in the correct direction. Just a pity I can't mark you both as the answer!
Interestingly enough, I had to do the exact same thing recently. Following the steps Christian described, I got it to work the first time through. For prosperity, here is the entire workflow I followed:
Created a RC file as described in the orginal question
Created a app.manifest, preserving whitespace characters, which are VERY IMPORTANT for this to work. As stated in previous answers, the file size must be a multiple of 4.
Ran RC.EXE as described in the original question against the rc to generate the .res file
Edited my Project.VBP file to include the following line near the top:
ResFile32="Resources.res"
Built EXE in standard vb6 environment. When deployed on a vista or win7 machine, the shield shows up and the user is prompted to run as administrator. When opening the EXE file in studio, I verified the resources.
Notepad++ tells me that the encoding on my app.manifest file is ANSI. It did not include an byte order mark at the start of the file.
If you are still having troubles, let me know and I'll share whatever I can with you. Other than that, I'm not sure what to tell you other than Works on my Machine!
VB6 has a quirk in that any resource element must be an exact multiple of 4 in length. Try padding the manifest file out with spaces to ensure this, and see if that changes the behavior.
This quirk was documented in Microsoft article Q297112 (archive).
Also, you might add the resource using the VB6 IDE instead of editing the VBP. The effect may be the same, but the resource editor is the standard means for doing this.
Using the Resource Compiler (rc.exe) is going the long way around. There is a much simpler option for embedding an application manifest within an executable, whether C++ or VB6 or just about any other language. The Manifest Tool (mt.exe) was written specifically to embed manifests within binaries and is provided free of charge with the Windows SDK. The added benefit of using mt.exe is that it automatically handles any necessary padding.
Simply run the following command line after the binary has been compiled. I have used the naming convention used internally by the Visual C++ 2005 compiler, where the manifest filename contains the full program name with ".intermediate.manifest" appended.
mt.exe -nologo -manifest "program.exe.intermediate.manifest" -outputresource:"program.exe;#1
Update: I have personally been using this in an automated build process with VB6 executables for over two years now. It has been so successful that we have eliminated OS compatibility tests - specific to manifests - from our regression testing.