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Nullsoft, 1997-2004 (2004)

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Re: Nullsoft, 1997-2004 (2004)

#51

Post by gh02t »

ecliptik wrote: post #20

My favorite Nullsoft software that came out the end of this era was WASTE [1]. Peer-to-peer (back when P2P was all the rage), encrypted, decentralized private networks. Group of friends and I used it post-college as a way to share files and chat, and was much better than AIM or other instant messaging at the time. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WASTE

I always thought WASTE was so cool, but my family was pretty late get off of dialup to be able to actually use it. Sounds like it's still around in some form, do people actually use it nowadays?

Re: Nullsoft, 1997-2004 (2004)

#52

Post by zedpm »

p2detar wrote: post #45

Additionally to Winamp, I guess what I will always remember Nullsoft with is also "NSIS - Nullsoft Scriptable Install System" [0]. In a previous job I sat down, read the docs and wrote a Windows-Installer for our product using this thing, since management didn't want to pay for InstallShield. What made quite an impression on me back then was the fact that the scripting language somewhat resembles assembly. [1] Also,…

Yep, NSIS is awesome and my team is still using it to package Windows builds of at least two apps. I was pleasantly surprised to see Tauri [0] includes NSIS as one of its built-in installer options.

0 - https://tauri.app/ 1 - https://tauri.app/distribute/windows-installer/

Re: Nullsoft, 1997-2004 (2004)

#54

Post by a-dub »

p2detar wrote: post #45

Additionally to Winamp, I guess what I will always remember Nullsoft with is also "NSIS - Nullsoft Scriptable Install System" [0]. In a previous job I sat down, read the docs and wrote a Windows-Installer for our product using this thing, since management didn't want to pay for InstallShield. What made quite an impression on me back then was the fact that the scripting language somewhat resembles assembly. [1] Also,…

back in the days when i was doing windows desktop apps, this was the way. installshield was such a piece of hot enterprise garbage that felt like it was designed by management consultants. overengineered, way too complicated, way too many steps to do the simplest of things. it was literally a case study in how not to do software.

Re: Nullsoft, 1997-2004 (2004)

#55

Post by hunter2_ »

bityard wrote: post #48
SyneRyder wrote: post #14

For those who might not know: > With Nullsoft gone and Frankel spending his time building a special-effects computer for his electric guitar... I don't know what happened to the Jesusonic he was building then, but Justin Frankel ended up creating Reaper, the cross-platform Windows/Mac/Linux digital audio workstation that is a solid Pro Tools competitor in a mere 16 MB download: https://www.reaper.fm/ The installer fo…

I seem to recall he was also working on some software that allowed musicians to jam together over the internet, it somehow took advantage of inherent latency instead of just trying to minimize it. Edit: found it: https://www.cockos.com/ninjam/

I've never used it, but it's a fascinating idea. The quirk is that no two participants, assuming they're each actually playing and not just listening, will hear the same thing. The following things happen simultaneously:

* Alice will play for X measures, while hearing what everyone else (including Bob) played X measures ago

* Bob will play for X measures, while hearing what everyone else (including Alice) played X measures ago

So for the measures mentioned above, Alice might conclude that things went very well, and Bob might conclude that things didn't jibe, and even if these were each true objective facts, they could both be correct as they are not discussing the same thing. There can be no retrospective discussion of a shared experience, only of individual experiences.

Re: Nullsoft, 1997-2004 (2004)

#57

Post by mewse-hn »

p2detar wrote: post #45

Additionally to Winamp, I guess what I will always remember Nullsoft with is also "NSIS - Nullsoft Scriptable Install System" [0]. In a previous job I sat down, read the docs and wrote a Windows-Installer for our product using this thing, since management didn't want to pay for InstallShield. What made quite an impression on me back then was the fact that the scripting language somewhat resembles assembly. [1] Also,…

My first IT job in the late aughts we had a small windows utility that came packaged in a zip file rather than an installer, and we wanted to deploy it across the network. I figured out what registry keys the .exe needed and created a NSIS installer that could be run silently, quickly, and remotely - fun stuff.

Re: Nullsoft, 1997-2004 (2004)

#58

Post by hunter2_ »

mauricio wrote: post #41

Looking back at this, has there been a maverick company like Nullsoft since then? It's sad, but AOL may have killed off the last one.

Not a "company" but the SQLite story gives me maverick vibes.

https://sqlite.org/consortium.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSVgeMoXJTs

Re: Nullsoft, 1997-2004 (2004)

#60

Post by gonesilent »

rickcarlino wrote: post #31
dexwiz wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We had a private network on campus circa 2010. Streaming was up and coming but not huge. Gnutella was great on the gigabit intranet. You could download entire HD movies in minutes where conventional torrents may be hours.

Gnutella is a mild obsession for me. The way that the protocol was designed and also the way that it saw a mainstream adoption has always fascinated me. For anyone reading this thread who is curious, I wrote a functional client this year for fun: https://github.com/RickCarlino/gnutella-bun-client/

It took a ton of work to keep the network clean. I did the gnutella.wego site back in the day. Gnutella was made when napster had 50 users and we all told him he was fcked. So gnutella was made to not use servers. Justin gave napster the code for song length and such to integrate with Napster.
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