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XPlode 4 XML Script Generator


Maelstorm

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The previous thread that has the old version and some basics on how to use it can be found here: http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=42268

I have included a readme.txt file that you need to read before you ask for help.

READ THE README.TXT FILE INSIDE THE ARCHIVE.

I will not help you if you ask a question that has been answered in the readme.txt file. If you need assistance, then post a support request to this thread. DO NOT EMAIL ME AS I DO NOT RESPOND TO EMAILS. PMs here on the board are ok.

INTRODUCTION

Although I have taken great care in programming and testing this software, so in the event that you do find a bug, please let me know. There are some defaults at the beginning of the program files which should make sense for most systems. But, if you need to modify something, don't modify anything below the DO NOT MODIFY line. Futhermore, if for whatever reason that you feel compeled to modify something below the DO NOT MODIFY line, I would like to know about it. I'm also taking feature requests as well. But, before anyone asks, I'm not going to implement the file-io structures at this time so don't bother to ask.

This script was designed to work on my system, but I have made a number of improvments. One of which is the inclusion of most of the XML structures that XPlode understands. Also new and improved is better syntax error checking on field data and record order.

One very important change is the addition of the START and END directives. These MUST be present and MUST be the FIRST and LAST records in your DB files. The GenData.vbs script which automatically generates the db files used by GenXplodeXML.vbs has been updated to reflect this.

Another important change is the addition of a third command line paramter. The config file parameter. This allows you to take a bare config that consists of data from <config> to </config> (tags included) and automatically insert it into the output file. The insertion is as-is with no modification to the config data.

Another noteworthy change is the error messages themselves. Many error messages will have 2 line numbers. One with the acutal error, and the other line is not actually where the error is, but is related to the error. This type of error message is most common in stucture formatting errors.

The new command line format is as follows:

cscript.exe genxplodexml.vbs <input file> <output file> [<config file>]

-OR-

wscript.exe genxplodexml.vbs <input file> <output file> [<config file>]

The new config file option is used with the CONFIG directive. If you have a CONFIG directive in your DB file, then you *MUST* specifiy it on the command line or in the GUI. If you don't, it will display an error and exit.

FILES

There are 2 archives attached to this post. You will need 7-zip to extract them which can be found here. I recommend version 3.13 as it is the latest release version.

The first archive, Novice.7z, is the one that most of you will want. It contains the GenData.vbs and GenXPlodeXML.vbs programs as well as a number of example files.

The second archive, Advanced.7z, is ment for ADVANCED users and discusses advanced topics such as on the fly XML code generation that can be used to dynamically configure an XPlode installation. This follows the architecture that I have developed for my installation system. Because it's for me, it may or may not work with your setup without major modifications. Because of this, no support is offered for the advanced archive unless you discover a bug. Note that for the advanced package, you will also need the Novice package as well.

ADVANCED

My installation system current has 3 major sections. They are listed as follows:

FONTS

MEDIA

SOFTWARE

Each section is divided into multiple categories. In the advanced archive, you will find a number of tools to help facilitate this. One of which is a new tool called GenMainIndex.vbs. It takes the filelist.txt file and converts it into a batch file that contains the main index. You will also need to modify the file SYSTEM-GENXML.CMD to match the paths used in your system. Read the readme2.txt file for information on making modifications to the software, including adding new categories and sections.

Once again, any questions or problems, reply to this thread. PMs are ok, but do not email.

[EDIT 04-10-2005]

A coding error was discovered in the advanced package in the CMD script file SYSTEM-GENXML.CMD. This error is clearly my fault and I do appologize for making such a supid mistake and not catching it sooner.

[EDIT 04-20-2005]

As stated in the information above, you need to use 7-zip to extract the files in the archive. 7-zip can be found here: http://www.7-zip.org/

I recommend using version 3.13 as that is the last release version.

Please make a note of this.

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  • 3 months later...

I have just had ago at using the scripts and I have to say that its quite handy but it is not all that easy to understand and use.

It will help speed up the boring process of entering in all the tags and I quite like it but It will not be of use to me because I use custom tags in my code for the new features that I have added and will in the future.

I think that this is to hard for most people to use, I think a lot of people that visit are not advanced computer users and this could be out of their range. If you make a interface for this then it might get peoples attention but dont count on it.

I am still a bit shocked that no one answered.

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The generator is writen in VBScript. The user interface options in VBScript are limited, which is why I took the approach that I did. Although, I'm an accomplished programmer in the Unix environment, I'm not too familiar with C++ programming in Windows, which is why I picked VBScript. Something nice and easy to start with on this. At this time, I do not plan to write a GUI for this. But, you are welcome to do so if you want to.

The generator was written with the intent of being used to generate XML scripts on the fly during an installation. This allows me to use one program to select what to install while using XPlode to actually run the install. This is quite usefull for the end user to select what software that they want to install.

1. WIHU runs and the user selects the software to be installed.

2. WIHU executes the system-mainindex.cmd for each item that was selected. The main index script is called with a index as the parameter. This selects the software to be installed.

3. The system-genxml.cmd is executed to convert the db files into xml files for xplode.

4. XML files are checked to verify that they exist and is registed into RunOnceEX.

5. System Reboot

6. RunOnceEX is executed and calls XPlode which calls the individual application installation scripts.

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