[-I-]

Dear XPize and Vize Users.
Maybe you have wondered about why there still isn't any 64bit version of either xpize or vise,

Wel let me start by telling you that we did not forget you, and we did not just ignored you.
The reason why up till today there no version for you is that we simply do not have the tools and resource to build it for you..

huh?
In contrary to other projects xpize uses live updates of the pictures inside windows,

The advantage of this method is very important because it will let you be able to run windows update, (witch replaces your patched files so after than just patch the new files again) so you can have your system up to date, protecting you agains the latest bugs and hacks....

The downside however to this is that up until now there was simply no program availible that could do this patching on windows x64 bit files.

Thus in the time between xpize first came to be stable, and now, we probably got over 100 requests for a version
that we simply had no way of creating.

The good news
Things are chaging and lots of people including me have start a search for somebody who who could help us out.
and thanx to Icy EyeG: (formarly known as 'volvox') who actual made first contact there is now somone from NTcore modifying his resource patcher to support all the commands and scripting that we need to creat xpize64 and vize64
At this point i am prommised a testversion of the new patcher within 1 month from now, so you will probably have to be patiant a little while longer.

So what is going to happen now?

• Well first we all have to wait for the verry first pre-alpha (probably not so stable) test version of the scripting interface of the patcher.
  
• as soon as we have it we probably wil need to test what it can do, and give feedback to the developer.
  
• when the patcher gets anywhere near stable, we will have to slit up into 3 ways.
  • create test packs for xp64 and vista64
    
  • create documentation about how things work diferently from what resource pack authors were familiar to.
    
  • continue to help ntcore improve both usabillity and stabillity of the new features
  
  
• than after some time people will be invited to start testing the first beta's in live action
  however its verry uncertain whether this will be within weeks or months from now..
  
• whatever happens after for now is stil verry mutch in the dark and there is now way of predicting any kind of timescale.
  we all just have to be verry patient, and verry supportive.

So what can I do to help
Well i have asked ntcore to open up a paypall account and i think that for his effords and really helpfull possition towards me and others, and i really hope thant once i can post his details in here you will be as generous as you have been with other msfn projects and support him and us in improving stuf even further..

Conclusions
by now you guys should know that we are committed to doing this as fast as we can,
and the more time we spend on replying on questions like "is it really comming soon"
the less time we have to actually work on it...



// this topic should be sticky'd //

This post has been edited by -I-: 23 October 2007 - 07:51 AM

[-I-]

this space is reserved for aditional information, or updates

[XPero]

Very well done -I-.

My idea is the following: Once we have the first apha of the patcher, I will create a Vize version with it and will be providing that version to the x64 users that want to be testers. From this, we will get feedback on how the patcher works. Patcher author will also have feedback from me on his patcher's usage (easy to call it from code or not, bugs on scripts, etc...)

[ChrisKuhli]

Hello you both

As i would be very interested in a solution for my new x64 system i have a little backwards question: What will happen with the XPize development in future, meaning which version of .NET will be used in newer versions? For creating patchers also for Windows 2000 (as damian666 Vistapack or my cX2K/ XPize4Win2K (XIS)) i hope not higher then .NET 2!

Hopefully,
Chris

This post has been edited by ChrisKuhli: 26 September 2007 - 05:16 PM

[XPero]

.Net 2.0. Also please stay in topic or I will be forced to delete posts.

[-I-]

in short: for now this patcher will most likely only aply to new projets,
even though in theory it will possibly allow for combined versions of 32- and 64bit editions. (as this patcher support both).
in real practice you probably dont want to do all the extra work when rshacker.exe can do the same thing,

its not intended to this topic
but to answer your and other peoples questions...
for older versions of 32bit windows you probably have a choice between this and the old xpize versions...
though its not verry likely that you want to port your packs to this patcher on win2k as it most likely will only cost you a lot of time

.

This post has been edited by -I-: 27 September 2007 - 09:35 AM

[-I-]

Quit update

[-I-]

Yet another update

last weekend i recieved an email from ntcore, with the private link to a first version of the patcher.

sadly enouth my own harddisk on my x64 workstation is dying on me
and though its still in warrenty and i also have a spare disk arround,
I have yet to find some time, to swap disks and call in for warrenty...

xpero already has HIS version so im confident it'l work out,
also at this point im rather unsure about what will be the course for: xp64
(should it it be a backport of: vize or a clone to: xpize... )

i hope xpero can shead some light on it...

This post has been edited by -I-: 10 October 2007 - 06:18 AM

[XPero]

I haven't had too much time to test the patcher but I will be looking at it in a few days and will post here my findings.

[Icy EyeG]

-I-, on Oct 10 2007, 01:14 PM, said:

last weekend i recieved an email from ntcore, with the private link to a first version of the patcher.

I must say that i'm really surprised that a simple comment on the blog would generate such things.
It's good to know that we are coming to a step closer on having Xpize (or Vize) in 64-bit flavours.

Maybe it's too soon to ask, but will this new patching method allow to build a xpize vesion that will run on both 32-bit and 64-bit OSes or will they be separated? (I'm asking this because of the XIS dev... )

[-I-]

well that depends on if the resources etc are located in the same places and filenames ....

and / or if the packager is willing to create some sort of handler for any diferences in the two,

my guess though is that at least some files wil be diferent

i guess at least in the beginning it would be way more easy to just build a seperate package...

[Ford Freak]

I hate to bring up an old topic but I would like to know what's going on with 64 bit *ize.

[W3bbo]

Ford Freak, on Apr 25 2009, 11:43 PM, said:

I hate to bring up an old topic but I would like to know what's going on with 64 bit *ize.

The Anolis framework I'm developing has full support for patching x64 files. I just need to make some modifications to the package execution system so that it will intelligently patch the 32-bit versions of system files if present.

XP x64 is based on Windows Server 2003 (NT5.2) and not Windows XP (NT5.1) so a lot of the system files are different: shell32.dll has different Bitmap resources in 5.2 compared to 5.1, but there's a lot of common ground between them though. Fortunately I've got an x64 machine in my room so I can easily identify the differences and build them into the package definition file.

The final release of xpize 5 will feature full support for WS2003 x64 and Windows XP x64, but the next beta, due out tomorrow, and it'll be public, is still limited to x86 versions.