AutoPatcher readme
Disclaimer
SysDesk is not responsible for any damage caused by this software. There is no warranty. You are using this programme at your own risk.
What is in the distribution?
The following files should be within this distribution:
autopat.exe the AutoPatcher program file
dosstub.exe DOS (textmode) stub
readme.htm
this file!readme.txt
text-only documentationwinstub.exe
32-Bit Windows stubCAUTION!
Do not try to run the stubs! They will only produce nonsense and are likely to crash. They are only needed by autopat.exe.Installing
Installing is simple. Just put all files into some directory. It is very useful to have them in your path.
autopat.exe -O
<old file> -N<new file> -P<patch name> [-T<text file>] [-D] [-W]Commands within <> brackets are required, commands within [] brackets can be left out. Switches are case-sensitive!
-O
<old file>The name of the old file. If you give a path name it will be included in the patch so try to create the patch in the program directory if you don't want do include the path name.
-N
<new file>The name of the new file. Same thing with the path name as above.
-P
<patch name>The name of the output patch file. AutoPatcher creates self-running executables so this should be something with an .exe extension.
-T
<text file>A text file which will be included and displayed before the patch is applied.
-D
Makes the resulting patch a DOS executable (default).
-W
Makes the resulting patch a 32bit Windows executable (Windows 95/98).
To create a patch, for example to update an existing version of a program to a new version, you will let AutoPatcher compare the two files.
Example:
This will create a DOS executable update.exe which will update prog_old.exe to the contents of prog_new.exe. However, the file name will remain prog_old.exe.
Additionally, you may want to include a message to tell the user about important changes and new features. Use -Tmessage.txt to include the existing(!) text file message.txt which will be displayed if the patch is executed.
If you want to create a Windows executable instead you can use the -W switch. The text message will be displayed in a dialog box.
The user will always be asked if he really wants to apply the patch.
Please remember that AutoPatcher is still at beta stage. So there might be some bugs. Please send bug reports to
sysdesk@gmx.net.Currently there seems to be some difficulty when the new file is shorter than the old one. If this is the case the old file will be patched but will still have the old file size.
If you have any questions or suggestions or want to report a bug please send mail to
sysdesk@gmx.net.For more information on AutoPatcher or other SysDesk projects visit the SysDesk homepage at
http://www.sysdesk.notrix.de. Here you will also find the latest AutoPatcher version.You are free to distribute the AutoPatcher package as long as you do not charge any money for it and do not change anything.
AutoPatcher and all parts of it Copyright © 1999 by SysDesk, Holger Kühnle
AutoPatcher was developed using lcc-win32 by Jacob Navia and DJGPP by DJ Delorie using PMODE 3.07 by Tran (a.k.a. Thomas Pytel) and Matthias Grimrath.