Forums Developers Including exe?

I know that you can't/shouldn't include mIRC.exe in my script when I give it to other people, so now I'm wondering if it's okay to include the install exe. I'm asking this cause I'm working on a simple script for a site, and most people there are new to IRC and mIRC. So the easiest way would be to include mIRC.exe but since I can't do this I won't. So I thought if I can include the installation it would be a bit easier, cause I doubt most of the people on the site will download the installation and then extract the script-files into the directory.

And sorry if this post is confusing, I'm quite tired.

What I would do is add a note or something saying that the mIRC.exe file isn't included and provide a link to the download section of mirc.com

How would including the install exe with your distribution help? Users will still have to manually place your script and load it. Automatically installing mIRC and your script at the same time would require modifications to the mIRC installer (not good), or you creating a seperate installer for your script.

You can host the installer on your website, there's nothing wrong with that. I'm guessing it might be prefered if you linked to an official site's installer though. The idea is trust and integrity. There are all too many "mIRC" downloads pre-bundled with scripts and even edited executables.

My advice would be writing a short page explaining how to unzip and /load your script. If users can be educated enough learn /join and /me, then /load shouldn't that much to ask of them. You can even use WinZip's Self-Extractor that automatically displays a readme.txt once the files are extracted. If you have multiple scripts, create a loader script that On Start that checks and /loads everything then unloads itself.

Better yet, the WinZip Self-Extractor can automatically overwrite existing files, including mirc.ini, which already has all your settings and scripts loaded.

- Raccoon

If you include a premade mirc.ini then you don't have to load the script. It will already be loaded.

Including the installer or any kind of .exe would probably just turn me away from downloading your script all together. Not to mention it makes your download much bigger. It's better to not include the .exe and the mIRC license gives you a good excuse not too.

I already said that.

You did too, serves me right for posting in my sleep. :tongue:

Well, as he said, he is trying to attract people who know nothing about IRC or mIRC, not people who have been using IRC for years. So you might not like it, but someone who says "/load -rs what is that?" most likely would like something that would do it automatically. What I personally do is, I create a setup.exe, the setup.exe then uses HTTP to connect to the mIRC website and downloads the current version of mIRC. It then launches the installer for mIRC. After doing this, it replaces the mirc.ini with its own and that tells it to load the script, it then launches mirc.exe. Since you're not actually including any mIRC exe files with your script, I don't see how it could be a violation of the license, since all you are doing is, instead of using Internet Explorer to download the file from the mIRC website, you're using your setup.exe.

Thanks for the answers, I guess the easiest way for me would be to write a file that guides people through the installation and how to replace the script files.

Or what I have seen -- direct the user to simple type

load -rs install.mrc

and in the install.mrc file use the on *:LOAD: event to automatically load other files/make changes, etc

I'd include in a self-extractor:

• A subfolder with my script files (of course);
• a temporary subfolder with my "mirc.ini" inside, already configured to load my script files and other non-default changes;
• a "readme.txt" file, teaching how to download and install mIRC in the same folder the user extracted my files;
• an "install.bat" batch file which replaces the default "mirc.ini" by mine, then removes the temp subfolder, runs "mirc.exe" and deletes itself.

The temporary subfolder with my "mirc.ini" would be there to make sure the file wouldn't be replaced by the default mIRC one when it's installed (I'm not sure if it would without asking for a confirmation.. anyway, doing this, you drop this possibility and another explanation).
This item and the last one are just for the sake of automation.. less things to explain in "readme.txt" and more certainly the user Joe the Dumb wouldn't mess it up.

Of course the readme file should explain all these items, which seem really easy to follow, IMO.

The batch content could be something like this:

Edit - I've forgot the batch file can remove itself, so I dropped the "temp.mrc" item.

Just FYI..

del instal.bat needs the /y attrib
instead of manually filling in the temp path, use %1 and include it on the command line:
- instal.bat temp\path\here