Windows distribution

[jelmervdl]

After talking a bit about this with a couple of full-time Windows users I know (very technical audience, in no way representative…)

• Just an executable you download
  • 👍 easy for demos
  • 👍 easy to share (just dump it on a usb stick)
  • 👎 were do you keep the .exe if you want to keep it
  • 👎 no uninstaller to clean up translation models when you delete the app.
• Windows Store
  • 👍 one more place to be found
  • 👍 entry in the start menu
  • 👍 Uninstaller to clean up translation models
  • 👍 Automatic updates
  • 👎 Not that many people use the store, think about searching there for it
  • 👎 More work to distribute a new version
  • 👎 Not as easy to share
• Installer (msi package?)
  • 👍 entry in the start menu
  • 👍 uninstaller
  • 👍 we could add steps like "do you want to enable these and these features?"
  • 👎 Not as easy to share & demo as the single executable

[XapaJIaMnu]

We should provide an installer and a demo'able application so 1) and 3), although 2 is not that much effort on top of 3...

[tooolbox]

Recently came across this project and was excited as it was the only offline translation software I could find with a prebuilt Windows binary that did not require an installer. Unfortunately I am running a rather old machine (Windows Server 2008) and the executable crashes. (I did see you binaries were spec'd as 2022 and 2019 respectively, but it was worth a shot.)

Not sure if it's possible to backport to older versions of Windows, but consider this a point of feedback.

[XapaJIaMnu]

@tooolbox thank you for your feedback. Unfortunately, github doesn't offer Windows server 2008 virtual hosts, so we can't target this platform.

That being said, could you try to run the executable under powershell? It might give you some hints as to why it is crashing. It could be something as simple as having to install a more recent MSVCPP redistributable runtime.

[tooolbox]

@XapaJIaMnu I see, well that is a shame but I understand.

I tried running it in PowerShell (i.e. I typed .\translateLocally-windows-2019.exe) but there was no output, the command returned immediately and then I got the crash window several seconds later. Not sure if PowerShell has some special way to hook the shell to process so it receives output from it.

[XapaJIaMnu]

How about if you try the command line interface? .\translateLocally-windows-2019.exe -h .\translateLocally-windows-2019.exe -a .\translateLocally-windows-2019.exe -d en-et-tiny

I am not familiar with how windows handles crashes, sadly...

[kpu]

Making a guess here: given how old the OS is, what CPU is it running on? Might just be invalid instruction.

[tooolbox]

How about if you try the command line interface?

Unfortunately, none of those commands produced output in the terminal, just the crash window popping up.

Making a guess here: given how old the OS is, what CPU is it running on?

In this case, AMD Opteron 6172

[XapaJIaMnu]

Yepp, @kpu is right, your processor doesn't support the avx instruction set which is a requirement due to our usage of still using mkl...

I'll try to produce a build for you the week after.

[tooolbox]

Yepp, @kpu is right, your processor doesn't support the avx instruction set which is a requirement due to our usage of still using mkl...

Ah, gotcha.

I'll try to produce a build for you the week after.

Sweet, thanks!