HPC:Factor CAB Maker

I have a new toy for all your subscribers. CAB Maker!

If you haven't already guessed, CAB Maker is a web service that creates CAB file installers for Windows CE, Handheld PC's, Palm-Sized PC's and the Pocket PC.

This is beta, so if the community want to try it out and feed back, please do so here in this thread.

I have tested it on the only working CE device that I have that supports CAB files - my trusty 320LX and it does work for me. I have not tested any other platform H/PC or otherwise.

CAB Maker may be of use in the following scenarios:

• You want to create an installer file that pre-sets your basic registry settings and applications as a method of faster recovery after a hard reset. A single CAB file can be made to configure many basic operating system and shell settings, install basic utilities (such as a registry editor) without undertaking manual effort
• You wish to release a piece of software and wish to create a basic installer package for release
• You with to re-package an existing application's installer to bypass an error/issue
• You wish to create an installer package for an existing application that currently has no installer, to make it easier to use the program (please get in touch to the HPC:Factor SCL!!)

The tool takes the annoying complexity and horrid minor-system requirements out of building Windows CE CAB files.
It would be really great if people wanted to create installers for hither-to "manual install" programs for CE. CAB Maker will register an uninstall for them too, so with this the community can make CE apps more approachable for everyone.

It is quite resource intensive, so I am only allowing subscribers to beta test it at the moment (and if I am honest it will likely remain as a subscriber perk). Silver and higher subscribers have no limitations. Bronze subscribers get a little advert for HPC:Factor added to the installer file.

Access CAB Maker
To access CAB Maker please visit https://cabmaker.hpcfactor.com/

Instructions for use
Instructions can be found in the following CESD article https://www.hpcfactor.com/support/cesd/200266/using_hpcfactor_cab_ma...

Pretty cool Chris...nice job.

Nice! I will try it out with some .exe from CeGCC soon, I hope.

Update:
I compiled HelloWorld cab from CeGCC .exe, it should work on Windwos CE .NET 4.1+ devices.

Oh yes, will you be supporting TLS / SSL on it?

Edited by stingraze 2022-03-11 1:39 AM




Attachments
----------------
HPCFactorCABMaker.HelloWorld.cab (56KB - 2 downloads)

Needless to say, this is not for apps for Windows CE 1.x devices, which don't support CAB file installation.

Thanks. It has taken a couple of week to put together. 11,220 lines (of which 7464 are Elara API). So a respectable 3,756 of new code.


Let us know how you get on. In theory it should work with PsPC and PPC too, although I haven't put any platform blocks in place at the moment to stop a PPC CAB running on CE core or vice versa.

TLS is now enabled.

You were the first person to generate a CAB who wasn't me

It says that on the 4th paragraph in the manual too

https://www.hpcfactor.com/support/cesd/200266/using_hpcfactor_cab_ma...


I have been quite meticulous about the server cleaning up after itself. Once your session has timed out / an hour elapses - whichever comes first. You lose anything sitting on the UI and the server will expunge your file uploads. So please don't dilly dally

That's really cool! Any chance of having a cli version of this to incorporate into cegcc makefiles?
This would be amazing for creating full featured open source build pipelines!

Karpour,

I had a feeling that you were going to ask me that fairly quickly.

My answer is no, I won't be compiling any CLI files - it's backed on Visual Studio build tools anyway, so it cannot be considered to be open source. It is however entirely an API based REST service (apart from logon which is processed in the bootstrap currently to prevent people from making calls to it), so we could perhaps have a conversation about allowing that in a controlled sense - but it would only be for higher tier subscribers.

Hi All!.................................................................................................Not that I understand much about cab making, however as I am presently returning to WinCE + WRP proxy ( and less from Devuan Linux) I will need to explore your offering, sounds like a useful utility. ...................................................Regarding dilly dallying........I often have multiple HPCFactor connections going and forget to sign out, so I'm pleased you are taking care of things........part of this is because I have several devices running as I work out the kinks in getting vintage HPC's near fully functional on-line again ................................................... joval on J720/WinCE +WRP/open-wifi to WPA2 via built in ESP8266/PIE4

The site doesn't care about open connections - you're using your battery up on the main site because of the AJAX timers though

This is just about keeping your data off my disk's and me recusing myself of liability because people lose something.

I can confirm the cab created by HPC:Factor CAB Maker to correctly install .exe made by CeGCC in specified location (under Program Files) on Sigmarion 3.
I could also run the .exe correctly.

-stingraze

Edited by stingraze 2022-03-12 9:00 AM

Good to know. Thanks.
Is it easy enough to use?

Yes, it was easy for me.

I have now implemented platform blocking on CAB Maker.
You will now find a row of platform which you can specify as being unsupported. There doesn't seem to be a credible, definitive source of information on what should actually be put in the cab header file for this. Equally, where there are sources they often disagree on whether cases or spaces are important.

Feedback on whether I have any of these correct would be helpful. I can confirm that flagging a CAB as unsupported on H/PC 2.0, you get an unsupported warning message as expected.

The issue with installing files to the root of the file system have been fixed. There doesn't seem to be a Macro for it, so I had to code in some workarounds to get it to accept it nicely.

I have updated CAB Maker's documentation to account for enhancements that have been made to it https://www.hpcfactor.com/support/cesd/200266/using_hpcfactor_cab_ma...
I have added some tips at the end to clarify some of the learning we've made in recent days and weeks as well as some bits that might have been confusing to users (for example original CAB Maker required you to perform certain character escapes and as of the last week or so, it will now do them for you.

As far as I am aware, the known bugs queue for CAB Maker is now empty

It works a lot smoother now, but, I still get:
Oh Noes!

Warning: Section [DefaultInstall] key "AddReg" - there are no section entries to process
Warning: Section [DefaultInstall] key "AddReg" - there are no section entries to process
Error: Section [ShortcutPath0] does not have an entry in section [DestinationDirs]
adding that root file