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Nuno Brito

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Posts posted by Nuno Brito

    Open Sourcing Windows 9x

    in Windows 9x/ME

    Posted

    No, it provided code for emulating Windows OS.
    You are wrong.

    WINE acronym is very explicit by nature "Wine Is Not an Emulator"

    Most DLL's found on wine distributions will work just good on regular Windows environments, except the ones who have been custom modified to work with custom characteristics required for the Wine project (registry hives handling is such example). I have used them on a few occasions to avoid use of MS copyright restricted software.

    I suggest that you start by reading the wiki page:

    Functionality

    As of mid-2007, Wine runs some software with good stability and most software with minor issues. Most native Microsoft Windows DLLs necessary for the execution of 32-bit Windows binaries have compatible Wine counterparts. The developers of the Direct3D portions of Wine have continued to implement new features such as pixel shaders to increase game support.[9] Wine can also use native DLLs directly, thus increasing functionality, but then a license for Windows is needed unless the DLLs were distributed with the application itself.

    And about this:

    It has the same frontend(which requires no reverse-engineering, since it's sufficiently well documented in MSDN), but a completely different backend.

    MSDN doesn't document everything and you're bound to get stuck several times trying to understand how the Win32 API actually works.

    This is also mentioned on the wiki page:

    The project has proved time-consuming and difficult for the developers, mostly because of incomplete and incorrect documentation of the Windows API[citation needed]. While Microsoft has documented most Win32 functions, some areas such as file formats and protocols have no official Microsoft specification. There are also undocumented low-level functions and obscure bugs[citation needed] that Wine must duplicate precisely in order to allow some applications to work properly. Consequently, the Wine team has had to reverse engineer many function calls and file formats in such areas as thunking.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wine_(software)

    I've stumbled on this difficulty many times, MS simply doesn't give away their trade secrets.

    As I've mentioned before - the Wine and ReactOS projects are the best (open source) option to start learning how these things work. On this case I would focus on Wine as they focused for many years on Win9.x and this is still visible today.

    :)

    0

    [tool] addons2wpi converter

    in Windows Post-Install Wizard (WPI)

    Posted

    eheh I know what you mean.

    We share a very good language, it's just too bad that the rest of world doesn't understand it like we do.. :whistle:

    So what i can understand is that your tool is more for "transforming" the .inf (? or that text files) of the nlite addon language to the wpi "language" right?

    It will:

    • unpack the addon file
    • read the inf file and get the command line
    • copy files to the target folder
    • write changes on config.js

    The complete description can be read from the source code.

    If you need more features then perhaps we can also add them.

    See you later! :)

    0

    [tool] addons2wpi converter

    in Windows Post-Install Wizard (WPI)

    Posted

    Quick translation:

    Can this tool and/or WPI handle other filetypes besides .exe such as themes?

    Reply:

    [portuguese]

    Olá!

    Realmente é raro ver mais gente da nossa "terrinha" por estas bandas e fico feliz de ver mais conterrâneos.

    Não faço ideia se seja possível copiar ficheiros de um lado para o outro com o WPI, terás mesmo de perguntar ou ler a documentação para ter a certeza. O meu objectivo era ter uma ferramenta deste tipo para facilitar a conversão dos addons para o formato WPI mas também comecei recentemente a mexer com este método.

    [/portuguese]

    Translation:

    Nice to see more people from our home land.

    I don't know if it's possible to copy files from one folder to another as you mention, guess you'll have to ask other members or read WPI's documentation to be sure. My goal was a simple tool to convert addons to the WPI format and I've just recently began working with it.

    :)

    0

    Driver collections other than Drickerpacks.net

    in nLite

    Posted

    Not that I'm aware of.

    DriverPacks is quite complete and a lot of human effort is flowing onto their project to make things work well.

    If you only need a few drivers, read the documentation from MS regarding unattended installs and learn how to integrate drivers by yourself.

    But why don't you like DriverPacks and then ask for other similar projects if they would all end up having the same result? :blink:

    -----

    You can extract only the drivers you like to have included from their packs but this will imply having to understand how they work.. :sneaky:

    0

    Vista Update Integrator New Version 1.0Beta4!

    in Unattended Windows Vista/Server 2008

    Posted

    Hi paraglider, nice to see you here! :)

    My machine doesn't display a option to uninstall .NET so I can't remove the existent files.

    Thank you for this suggestion.

    ---

    Albert, the web installer hangs while trying to install .NET - I went to the microsoft site to download the whole package but I'm at home and my web connection is simply too slow/limited to consider large downloads as the package you include doesn't work on my machine.

    I'm looking for a portable tool capable of working on XP/Vista machines without requiring a .NET framework and I'll use the tool mentioned by sp00f.

    Good luck with your work.

    :)

    0

    How do the regular folk view IE8?

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    I'm a regular folk.

    Moved to Firefox a few years ago and I don't have any reasons to return into to the domain of IE.

    ---

    firefox brought a feeling of democracy in a sort of twisted way as we are no longer tied to the wishes of a corporation nor I will have to spend any money to buy licenses or be afraid to pass copies of it to my friends.

    --

    Have built several sites and either FF or IE (6 & 7) work good enough.

    Other browsers are also good, diversity is welcome to bring more competition.

    :)

    0

    Open Sourcing Windows 9x

    in Windows 9x/ME

    Posted

    Tinykrnl had a very similar goal a few years ago and has effectively managed some level of success replace most of the initial boot files used for XP.

    http://66.102.9.104/search?q=cache:fBabang...=pt&strip=1

    One remanescent of this legacy was WinRoot - a Windows XP based boot disk that is sized in 5Mb. (who said NT was unefficient?)

    http://winbuilder.net/download.php?view.6

    Alex closed down TinyKrnl but he is still active here: http://www.boot-land.net/forums/Native-NT-Toolkit-t3791.html

    ---

    The solution for open source OS that you're looking for is called linux.

    It is smaller, faster and much more adaptable than any MS OS will ever be.

    Guess the only downside is that MS coded programs won't run very well but these barriers are slowly becoming thinner as web based applications become popular and WINE compatibility moves forward.

    You can now browse on youtube, wikipedia or post on forums regardless of the OS you use and this is something that MS struggled very hard to avoid.

    Understanding the Windows API is not easy as there are a lot of tricks and traps that are added along the road to ensure enough headaches for people outside MS to replicate them (no public documentation also complicates things). I remember my own complications trying to reverse-engineer the registry win32 api functions to allow raw file handling and getting stuck on the part where a new hive was not recognized as valid by regedit.

    http://www.boot-land.net/forums/index.php?...t=0&start=0

    If you want to spend your time and talent coding better open source DLL's then I really suggest joining the efforts of the Wine Team: http://winehq.org

    As the saying goes: "The more, the merrier.." :sneaky:

    -----

    btw: But if you're interested in decoding Win32 API then I would have a few requests/challenges in case you're interested! :)

    0

    [project] uxp

    in Multi-Boot CD/DVDs

    Posted

    Thank you!

    Do you have any idea how runWPI.exe will work?

    Does it load the registry hives or modify the unnatended part of the XP I386 folder?

    If I just need to run it then this makes the task of automating this step so much easier.

    :)

    0

    Vista Update Integrator New Version 1.0Beta4!

    in Unattended Windows Vista/Server 2008

    Posted

    Good to see Siginet/DriverPacks members actively working on this area, at the moment I was only aware of these talks: http://forum.driverpacks.net/viewtopic.php?id=142

    And on the VistaPE side this is also being discussed: http://www.boot-land.net/forums/index.php?...ost&p=31858 where boot land members are pondering to create and support a new tool from scratch or merge human efforts with other teams more focused on this specific Windows Install area. (our area of expertise are boot disks)

    But with so many people working on separate sides we're all bound to miss the opportunity to make a good open source tool for everybody to enjoy since this is a much needed feature for the future.

    I would really be happy to to see a common effort to produce such tool.

    :)

    0

    Vista Update Integrator New Version 1.0Beta4!

    in Unattended Windows Vista/Server 2008

    Posted

    Hi Albert!

    This sounds like a good program but I ran into some difficulties as .NET framework 3.5 is always hanging on my machine and refuses to install as expected.

    My OS is Portuguese Vista Home Edition x64

    Do I really need to install a 200Mb framework to run this program?

    http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details...en#Requirements

    Just a suggestion, please consider using a more flexible language that doesn't limit your program to be depending on the .NET framework.

    AutoIt (basic related) is a good example of this: http://www.autoitscript.com/autoit3

    You'd be able to code a program that would surely run on most windows machines without any worries about including (redundant) .NET frameworks.

    I personally use delphi 7 (pascal based) for years and it's a heck of a good compiler and many other good options exist for C as well.

    This would be a plus when compared to other programs with similar functions that explicitly require .NET

    ---

    Downloaded beta 3 and used UniExtract to take a glimpse on the binaries you've included.

    To replace SmartWIM you can use WimUtil (coded in AutoIt by a russian developer called Nikzzzz for NightMan, author of VistaPE): http://vistape.net/beta - very simple to be used as you can double click on the exe to see the instructions.

    It's free and the developer will likely add any additional functions that you require, he can be contacted here: http://www.boot-land.net/forums/View-Membe...ofile-m711.html

    oscdimg.exe can be replaced with mkisofs.exe, look for it under the same page I've posted for wimutil and I'm sure that you can find replacements for most of the restricted copyrighted files that you're including on the package.

    ---

    ...

    And I am not sure you can distribute MS EXE files.

    I'm quite sure that it's not legal to distribute files developed by Microsoft without their express permission but then again I think that Albert doesn't need to worry that much since vlite is also doing the same redistribution with the wimfltr driver or has nuhi a special permission to distribute files from their WAIK? :whistle:

    ---

    Albert, since you're just starting up.

    Would you consider an open source development?

    It would likely relief you from a unlikely court-room process as it would become a non-profit development and also allow many other developers along the road to help you and provide additional features and ensure it would be used by other popular projects.

    I can help with free website/file hosting for large bandwidth usage and provide testing feedback as this project has potential to become very useful for a few Vista related projects such as VistaPE and Driverpacks but it would require team work to see this program grow instead of falling into oblivion within a few months.

    Wether open/closed source and requiring .NET or not I'll still be happy to help in whatever needed.

    Thanks for sharing your work with us. Take care.

    :)

    0

    [project] uxp

    in Multi-Boot CD/DVDs

    Posted

    Here are my current modifications up to this point:

    - [added] Parted Magic

    - [added] VMWARE emulation script

    - [added] New logo artwork

    - [moved] Addons folder to root of project

    - [updated] Using Winbuilder 074

    - [updated] WinRoot project with new files

    - [improved] Clean up button will prepare the project for redistribution

    - [adding] WPI support..

    For Parted Magic to work it will require that the ISO label is "Parted Magic". This can be edited inside the image but I'm thinking on talking with the author to make things easier for those who want to include this OS as an option.

    I like Parted a lot, very complete and a good looking boot option.

    ---

    Because I moved the Addons folder to the root, the nlite scripts are giving some headaches, will likely move it back to the previous location.

    Also having some doubts with WPI, the script and tool are completed but how should the RunOnceEx entries be created to run at installation time without using nlite?

    :)

    0

    I want to write my own window manager / shell for windows xp

    in Programming (C++, Delphi, VB/VBS, CMD/batch, etc.)

    Posted

    You can start from scratch or pick a project already in development and join the team effort.

    BBlean is a good option, open source and very efficient: http://www.bb4win.org/news.php

    ReactOS comes with an open source shell that you can also use: http://www.sky.franken.de/explorer/

    Personally, I recommend getting in contact with an already estabilished project as they can guide you and maybe this way save a lot of time rather than learning everything from scratch.

    :)

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