Good Way to Do Versioning

[kramer.newsreader]

Not really sure if this is the appropriate news group for this, but
here goes.

We are developing an application (not just an EXE-more than a few
files) and with the second real release, we have figured out that we
have to start worrying about users having different version of the
files. We need some way to tag each file with its version so that it
can be read back during an install probably by a vb script (damn I with
that Windows shipped with PERL or python or some decent scripting
language).

I'd prefer not to put the version in the file name. Because the files
have to refer to one another, that would be a real mess. Anyway, it
occured to me to put the version in the the summary section of the file
properties (where do the file properties live anyway?), but that's not
so good. When I update the repository (we use SVN version control),
the update doesn't update the file properties summary section.
Likewise, if the file is sent over http, the section also clears.

Any ideas where to store this info that would be easily usable in a
script?

 

[gs]

try one of the development group. be it visual basic, c++. .net....

As for file property take a look at some vbscript reference on files and
folders.
have you tried using compression folder to see if file properties get
preserved?. However that only helps you with http not your repository
problem

decent scripting Lang? they say ms have a new one called monad that you can
download free. I have not tried it.

 

[MikeR]

Not really sure if this is the appropriate news group for this, but
here goes.

We are developing an application (not just an EXE-more than a few
files) and with the second real release, we have figured out that we
have to start worrying about users having different version of the
files. We need some way to tag each file with its version so that it
can be read back during an install probably by a vb script (damn I with
that Windows shipped with PERL or python or some decent scripting
language).

I'd prefer not to put the version in the file name. Because the files
have to refer to one another, that would be a real mess. Anyway, it
occured to me to put the version in the the summary section of the file
properties (where do the file properties live anyway?), but that's not
so good. When I update the repository (we use SVN version control),
the update doesn't update the file properties summary section.
Likewise, if the file is sent over http, the section also clears.

Any ideas where to store this info that would be easily usable in a
script?

Versioning info goes in the exe itself. Any other files like .ini, database,
text etc are not AFAIK able to be versioned. Don't confuse this with the version
number a source repository may assign.
Any decent install program can differentiate between versions. Take a look at
InnoSetup at http://www.jrsoftware.org/isinfo.php It's a very nice freebie, and
has it's own support newsgroups.
Mike

 

[Guest]

One option is to use the timestamp of the files to denote the version.
Setting a last-modified time of say 1:01 for version 1.01 is reasonably
informative, and will survive copying (but not FTP'ing unfortunately)

Executables and DLLs contain resource-strings which can be used to indicate
the version (what you see when you right-click and select 'properties' )
unfortunately that doesn't apply to other types of file, hence the
timestamp-method is more generally-useful.

Servant Salamander (http://altap.cz) is handy for bulk
timestamp-modification.

BTW, Decent scripting language depends on your requirements. PERL excels at
commandline string-manipulation and general data-processing. For building
small Windows apps though, you can't beat AutoIt.