Windows 32-bit XP Release

[geoffmcl]

As covered in #566 the current Windows release zips are incompatible, read will not run, in Windows XP, nor Server 2003, which is very sad...

Through the testing by @LWillms and myself, we seem to have found a reliable way to generate the appropriate Tidy.EXE...

Should also read other relevant points made in #515, #550, #560, and maybe others..

It seems to effect only builds by MSVC14 2015, and maybe later... all the earlier releases built with trusty MSVC10 2010 seem ok...

As time permits, will try to add new zips to the current 5.4 release...

For sure the lessons learned will be applied to the next 5.6 release...

[geoffmcl]

@LWillms have just added a tidy-5.4.0-w32-mt-XP.zip to the binaries

It runs fine in my old XP machine...

It would be most appreciated if you could download and test it in XP and Server 2003... thanks...

[LWillms]

I just saw that you added a new 32-bit Windows build. Thanks -- adding instead of replacing is OK with me.

But I am sure that not only the 32-bit version needs one which runs also on XP-level OSes, but also the 64 bit version. As we established in the other thread, the issue is not 32 bit vs. 64 bit, but Windows XP vs. later Windows versions. OK, I could not test that because I don't have a 64 bit Windows XP or Server 2003.

I was intitially confused because I had only XP on 32 bit and Win7 on 64 bit, so this led me to the wrong assumption that the issue was 32 bit vs. 64 bit, but it turned out to be Windows XP and Server 2003 vs. Windows 7 and later (I don't know about Vista).

[geoffmcl]

@LWillms glad you found the new 32-bit XP Windows build...

Now I am unsure if we need a 64-bit XP Windows build? Since neither of us have 64-bit XP we can't test it anyway... I will wait until I get a specific request, from a 64-bit XP owner, so they can test it first... I did build it, just not uploaded anywhere yet...

As I mentioned in the other thread, I think the Tidy 32-bit XP Windows build will run in a 64-bit XP OS through what MS call Windows-on-Windows, or WoW64, as they call it in later OSES...

The reverse, a 64-bit application will never run in a 32-bit OS!

There are some 32-bit applications that will not run in a 64-bit OS! That is if they include 32-bit kernel mode device drivers, or that plug into the process space of components that are implemented purely as 64-bit processes (e.g. Windows Explorer) - they cannot be executed on a 64-bit platform. See Wow64, and probably many others, for more details...

But Tidy is a very simple 32-bit service application, only in user mode, and should have no problems in 64-bit OSES, with WoW64, like in my Windows 10 64-bit... All the 32-bit Tidy apps I build run in it fine... and this should be the same for your Windows 7 64-bit...

I guess we will have to wait-and-see... thanks...

[LWillms]

OK with me.

[geoffmcl]

WARNING WARNING WARNING

See Windows binary tidy-5.4.0-w32-mt-XP.zip, added recently.

WARNING: While some strong effort has been made to provide a 5.4 Windows XP version of tidy.exe, using MSVC14 2015, this has not proved completely successful in all cases. We do not know exactly why!

Regrettably, if you have an XP like system, which seems to include Windows Server 2003, and this tidy.exe fails to run correctly, for any reason, then you have no other options but to upgrade the system to a later version of Windows, and/or, if you have the capability and tools, maybe build tidy from source in that system...

Alternatively, apparently some older versions of Tidy.exe, 5.2 and before, may still run... these were built using the MSVC10 2010 tool...

If you have this problem, then we can only state HTML Tidy no longer supports such old systems, and will not accept any issue on the subject! Sorry!

On the other hand, we would love to hear from you if it does successfully run in old systems, as it does in my ancient XP system... but not in the even older Windows 98!

Some thought will be given to this for the next 5.6, and later, releases, and the above positive feedback would help in this, but be sternly warned, release tidy.exe may not be compatible with Windows XP, and earlier systems!

Maybe this compatibility problem should be added to the Tidy website somewhere... suggestions welcome... thanks...

[balthisar]

Windows XP is officially out of support, so I'd have no problem dropping Tidy support for it. It's highly likely that Tidy doesn't work on Mac System 7 anymore, either!

On the other hand, @geoffmcl, you were pretty vociferous about continuing Win XP support last time, I seem to recall.

[geoffmcl]

With release 5.6 out-the-door, and have included a 32-bit version built with MSVC10, hope this can be closed...

If not please feel free to re-open, or perhaps file a new issue... thanks...