I am trying to work out the least disruptive way of beginning to experiment with Windows 8 development. I currently have a Windows 7 Ultimate PC (plenty of disk space, RAM and i7 CPU), and I have a copy of Windows 8 (not 8.1).
I have considered various options:
Convert my whole machine to Windows 8. (Not ideal right now, as I am in the middle of other work, but I may have to do this eventually).
Dual boot Windows 7 & 8. (Can't get this to work. Windows 7 is already installed, and though I can get Windows 8 to install on the second HD, I can't get its boot menu to see Windows 7. I suspect this would be easier if I installed Windows 8 first, but that would be a huge pain.)
Run either OS using a virtual machine. (I haven't looked into this yet, and I have no idea what is involved.)
As a final option, I wondered if it is possible to develop Windows 8 applications on a Windows 7 PC and remote debug on an attached Windows 8 device? (I'd prefer to do this, as it is a way I have worked often in the past while doing console development.)
Does anyone have any experience of any of this - positive or negative? It takes ages to experiment with this stuff, with the constant threat of recking my existing work environment. I'd really appreciate any advice or pointers to articles that deal with any of this stuff.
Microsoft do their loyal developers no favours. I've paid hundreds for modern hardware, Windows versions and Visual Studio, and still it seems difficult to say the least to develop for their latest OS.
Kind wishes ~ Patrick
Option 4 is not possible. In similar situation I went with option 2 and gratually migrate myself completly to windows 8.
If you have problems with boot try to ask on superuser.com or better search the web for guideline.
If you want to develop applications for Windows 8 don't go with option 3.Please see this post on installing Visual studio in VM.
Regarding option 2,verbatim from Microsoft
You must install the older operating system first, and then install the more recent operating system. If you don't (for example, if you install Windows Vista on a computer already running Windows 7), you can render your system inoperable. This can happen because earlier versions of Windows don't recognize the startup files used in more recent versions of Windows and can overwrite them.
But as #Antonio said there may be roundabout for option 2.
Related
while understanding the differences between 10.0.19041.0 and 10.0.22000.0 SDK ,I encountered
https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/downloads/windows-sdk/ this page. After looking into it , I understood 10.0.22000.0 is mainly for windows 11 applications .
If we select 10.0.019041 as the package and build the application, won't it run on windows 11.
If we want our application to be run on windows 11 do we need to choose 10.0.22000.0 over 10.0.19041.0.
Please correct me if my understanding is wrong.
Thanks for the help!
TLDR: No, your understanding is wrong. You can likely use whatever version you want and your application will run on both, Windows 10 and Windows 11.
Long with details:
It's true, the 10.0.19041 SDK is for Windows 10.
It's also true, 10.0.22000 SDK is for Windows 11.
Let's have a look from a user perspective:
When you download software, how often do you need to select the correct operating system? Not very often. So, somehow, the SDK version does not seem to be very important.
Let's have a look from a Microsoft perspective:
Does Microsoft want all developers require a rebuild of their Windows 10 programs once they release Windows 11? Certainly not, because this would mean that with the release of Windows 11, there wouldn't be a single application which runs on Windows 11. Microsoft couldn't even perform inhouse tests for multi-million-user software such as Adobe Reader.
Let's have a look from a technical perspective:
The Windows SDK provides the API definitions of Windows. The Windows API is very old. And since Microsoft does not want developers to rebuild and, even worse, let them fix breaking changes, Microsoft keeps that API incredibly stable. They will not change the API, they will only add new API methods.
The chance that the Windows API you use already existed in Windows 10 and still exists in Windows 11 is almost 100%. So your application compiled for Windows 10 will still work on Windows 11.
Likewise, if you compile with the Windows 11 API and don't use the most recent fancy API, your application will still work on Windows 10.
Example
Let's say you developed an application that manages Fonts. You have used the interfaces IDWriteFontSet, IDWriteFontSet2 and IDWriteFontSet3. With Windows 11, Microsoft has added IDWriteFontSet4. As long as you don't use that interface and stick to the previous 3 interfaces, your application will run fine. Once you start using IDWriteFontSet4, your application may crash on Windows 10 (potentially only if the user invokes the functionality, not so sure).
I have a HP Pavilion dv6 which ran the x32 version of Windows 10, and so I wanted to install x64 OS. Also just a small side-note, the computer was set-up with Windows Insider. Anyway, I also have a Mac, which I created a USB boot drive with x64 Win10 (I originally used the Windows Media Creation software on my dv6), but whenever I tried to open the setup.exe file my dv6 would just say that the software is not compatible. That lead me to think that maybe Windows Insider was having an impact on the OS being slightly newer and not exactly compatible with the setup file... so I stopped Windows Insider updates and rollbacked to the latest Windows. But nope, the file still complained that it wasn't compatible. Skip past 2 days worth of me trying to create a boot drive and booting up my HP, whenever trying to boot up my dv6 with the image loaded on manually or by using Unetbootin, my dv6 would only complain that it's a Non-system disk or the USB drive doesn't contain an operating system.
Simply, I would just like to update my dv6 which now (sorry, I forgot to mention this earlier) after rollbacking now gets stuck in a loop of the green screen of death or blue screen of death and then "Recovering your computer" or something like that, from x32 to x64 os (and yes, I checked that it was capable of running x64 software).
Thanks,
Avoxel284
p.s. this is my first question, so sorry if I sound like some kind of noob or something...
p.s.s. i backed up my files, so all I need is to at least get it to some sort of OS.
I am a VisualC# programmer and an individual Unity3d game developer. I wanted to know if there was any problem if I upgraded from my windows 7 to windows 10, I wanted to know if there is any difference in performance. And one more thing.. From a programmers point of view is there any feature that I would not be able to get if I do not activate windows,meaning that I use deactivated Windows because I donot think why should I activate it.
New Windows versions introduce new API. E.g. GetSystemTimePreciseAsFileTime() was only added in Windows 8.
I am trying to install Sheridan controls (ActiveThreed 2.01) on Win7 64-bit, but evidently it is a 16-bit installer so it won't execute.
What would be the best way to get round this problem?
Can anyone comment on whether http://homepage3.nifty.com/takeda-toshiya/msdos/index.html would be helpful?
It took me months of googling to find a solution for this issue. You don't need to install a virtual environment running a 32-bit version of Windows to run a program with a 16-bit installer on 64-bit Windows. If the program itself is 32-bit, and just the installer is 16-bit, here's your answer.
There are ways to modify a 16-bit installation program to make it 32-bit so it will install on 64-bit Windows 7. I found the solution on this site:
http://www.reactos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=10988
In my case, the installation program was InstallShield 5.X. The issue was that the setup.exe program used by InstallShield 5.X is 16-bit. First I extracted the installation program contents (changed the extension from .exe to .zip, opened it and extracted). I then replaced the original 16-bit setup.exe, located in the disk1 folder, with InstallShield's 32-bit version of setup.exe (download this file from the site referenced in the above link). Then I just ran the new 32-bit setup.exe in disk1 to start the installation and my program installed and runs perfectly on 64-bit Windows.
You can also repackage this modified installation, so it can be distributed as an installation program, using a free program like Inno Setup 5.
You can't run 16-bit applications (or components) on 64-bit versions of Windows. That emulation layer no longer exists. The 64-bit versions already have to provide a compatibility layer for 32-bit applications.
Support for 16-bit had to be dropped eventually, even in a culture where backwards-compatibility is of sacred import. The transition to 64-bit seemed like as good a time as any. It's hard to imagine anyone out there in the wild that is still using 16-bit applications and seeking to upgrade to 64-bit OSes.
What would be the best way to get round this problem?
If the component itself is 16-bit, then using a virtual machine running a 32-bit version of Windows is your only real choice. Oracle's VirtualBox is free, and a perennial favorite.
If only the installer is 16-bit (and it installs a 32-bit component), then you might be able to use a program like 7-Zip to extract the contents of the installer and install them manually. Let's just say this "solution" is high-risk and you should have few, if any, expectations.
It's high time to upgrade away from 16-bit stuff, like Turbo C++ and Sheridan controls. I've yet to come across anything that the Sheridan controls can do that the built-in controls can't do and haven't been able to do since Windows 95.
I posted some information on the Infragistics forums for designer widgets that may help you for this. You can view the post with the following link:
http://forums.infragistics.com/forums/p/52530/320151.aspx#320151
Note that the registry keys would be different for the different product and you may need to install on a 32 bit machine to see what keys you need.
I am mostly posting this in case someone comes along and is not aware
that VB2005 and VB2008 have update utilities that convert older
VB versions to it's format. Especially since no one bothered to
point that fact out.
Points taken, but maintenance of this VB6 product is unavoidable. It would also be costly in man-hours to replace the Sheridan controls with native ones. Simply developing on a 32-bit machine would be a better alternative than doing that. I would like to install everything on Win7 64-bit ideally. – CJ7
Have you tried utilizing the code upgrade functionality of VB Express 2005+?
If not,
1. Make a copy of your code - folder and all.
2. Import the project into VB express 2005.
This will activate the update wizard.
3. Debug and get the app running.
4. Create a new installer utilizing MS free tool.
5. You now have a 32 bit application with a 32 bit installer.
Until you do this, you will never know how difficult or hard it
will be to update and modernize the program.
It is quite possible that the wizard will update the Sheridan controls
to the VB 2005 controls. Again, you will not know if it does
and how well it does it until you try it.
Alternatively, stick with the 32 Bit versions of Windows 7 and 8.
I have Windows 7 x64 and a program that will not run. However,
the program will run in Windows 7 32 bit as well as Windows 8 RC 32 bit.
Under Windows 8 RC 32, I was prompted to enable 16 bit emulation
which I did and the program rand quite fine afterwords.
I had 32-bit software with a 16-bit installer that I couldn't unzip. I solved it with otvdm which allows you to run windows 1.x, 2.x, 3 programs on win64. In fact, otvdmw allows you to select the program to run (otvdm is command-line).
16 bit installer will not work on windows 7 it's no longer supported by win 7 the most recent supported version of windows that can run 16 bit installer is vista 32-bit even vista 64-bit doesn't support 16-bit installer....
reference http://support.microsoft.com/kb/946765
Bottom line at the top: Get newer programs or get an older computer.
The solution is simple. It sucks but it's simple. For old programs keep an old computer up and running. Some times you just can't find the same game experience in the new games as the old ones. Sometimes there are programs that have no new counterparts that do the same thing. You basically have 2 choices at that point. On the bright side. Old computers can run $20 -$100 and that can buy you the whole system; monitor, tower, keyboard, mouse and speakers. If you have the patience to run old programs you should have the patience to find what you are looking for in want ads. I have 4 old computers running; 2 windows 98, 2 windows xp. The my wife and I each have win7 computers.
This question already has answers here:
Is there a IE tester for mac? [closed]
(7 answers)
Closed 10 years ago.
I'm a webmaster that use mac platform to develop. Can someone suggest me the best way to test my website with IExplorer using a Mac? There're some virtualizer such as parallel, crossover, wine and so on, can someone suggest me the best for this purpose?
Or some other workaround is appreciated (i really don't need an entire copy of windows, only to test my websites on IE6 and IE7 using my mac)
First: Look at the question linked to in the comments. If you just need to see what a site looks like, browsershots.org will do the trick. But if you need to fully test and debug, you need Windows. But that can be done too:
Purchase Parallels Desktop
Download free Windows virtual machines directly from Microsoft made specifically for this purpose. You can rename the .exe self-extracting archives .rar instead, and unpack with anything that can extract RAR files
Import the resulting virtual machine image into Parallels, and you're done
Just know that many of the Windows images are huge. You'll need something like 40GB free to download, unpack and convert the Windows Vista and Windows 7 images (once you're done, you can of course toss a bunch of stuff out again)
Edit: Oh, yeah, forgot to mention: The Windows images last about 3 months at a time before they lock down completely, and you have to download a fresh copy. Microsoft obviously isn't giving away fully-fledged Windows copies for free :)
One option is to join MSDN (Microsoft Developer Network subscription) to get access to all Windows versions in all languages etc. You can install those you need in separate Parallels virtual machines (VMWare and virtualbox would work as well).
This allows you to install the exact version some customer happens to have, e.g. certain old Windows Server with certain IE version, etc to replicate the environment for testing and regression testing.
I would say that virtual machine installations are a must so you get the exact complete real thing.
MSDN has different options, "OS only" would be probably enough for this need (I had other needs for Windows development tools as well so got the full MSDN). MSDN has a cost (on the order of $1k/year) but was worth it to get access to everything for development and testing purposes.
PS. The only fun thing was that as a Mac-based UNIX developer I had many versions of Windows and many versions of Linux installed on my MacBook, but only one installation of OSX ;-) Some people also thought it was fun to see a "Mac developer" with "MSDN subscription", but whatever gets the work done, is the way to go.