4 ms·

How did you turn Internet Explorer 8 into a 130kb EXE file? Why are you anonymous? Where is the source code?

by jart 6y ago

cedricd 6y ago
I agree with you on the latter two points, but for the first one, it sounds like the application is using IE's rendering engine built into all versions of Windows. So the executable is super small given that all the heavy lifting is in libraries already on your system.
SyneRyder 6y ago
It's just using the MSHTML.DLL rendering engine built-in to Windows, sadly.
- Jaruzel 6y ago
  I don't know how the author of Nessie specifically did it, but generally on the .NET platform, you have access to the Trident rendering engine by adding the WebBrowser control to one of the forms of your new application. From there, you gain all the event based functions and callable methods you'd expect a browser to use. I've written several of these type of 'toy' browsers over the years, and they work just like IE does. The only caveat is that you have to patch the registry first to allow the control to report (and render as) a useragent above IE 8. You can set it to report/render as IE 11 as the maximum. Via NuGet, you can download the WebBrowser2 control which is based on the new Edge Chromium based renderer. I haven't seen any new browsers using this properly yet (and I've not played with it either yet) - it will be good when people do, because although the renderer will still be Chromium, the browser UI can then be anything you want. I'm looking forward to people challenging the accepted browser UIs that we currently have. Of course, if you want to avoid the WebBrowser2 control, there's webkit.NET and Embedded Chromium which also can be built to bind with .NET apps.
  - SyneRyder 6y ago
    I thought I recognised your username! In case Jaruzel's too shy to mention it, he wrote a Gopher browser for Windows. If you're reading this thread because you're interested in small web topics (Gopher, Gemini, Tilde.Town, NetSurf, alt browsers) then you might like his browser too. It was my gateway into Gopher. http://www.jaruzel.com/gopher/gopher-client-browser-for-windows http://www.jaruzel.com/gopher/gopher-client-browser-for-wind...
    - Jaruzel 6y ago
      Aww Shucks. Thank you!

How did you turn Internet Explorer 8 into a 130kb EXE file? Why are you anonymous? Where is the source code?

by jart 6y ago

How did you turn Internet Explorer 8 into a 130kb EXE file? Why are you anonymous? Where is the source code?

I agree with you on the latter two points, but for the first one, it sounds like the application is using IE's rendering engine built into all versions of Windows. So the executable is super small given that all the heavy lifting is in libraries already on your system.

SyneRyder 6y ago

It's just using the MSHTML.DLL rendering engine built-in to Windows, sadly.

Jaruzel 6y ago
I don't know how the author of Nessie specifically did it, but generally on the .NET platform, you have access to the Trident rendering engine by adding the WebBrowser control to one of the forms of your new application. From there, you gain all the event based functions and callable methods you'd expect a browser to use. I've written several of these type of 'toy' browsers over the years, and they work just like IE does. The only caveat is that you have to patch the registry first to allow the control to report (and render as) a useragent above IE 8. You can set it to report/render as IE 11 as the maximum. Via NuGet, you can download the WebBrowser2 control which is based on the new Edge Chromium based renderer. I haven't seen any new browsers using this properly yet (and I've not played with it either yet) - it will be good when people do, because although the renderer will still be Chromium, the browser UI can then be anything you want. I'm looking forward to people challenging the accepted browser UIs that we currently have. Of course, if you want to avoid the WebBrowser2 control, there's webkit.NET and Embedded Chromium which also can be built to bind with .NET apps.
- SyneRyder 6y ago
  I thought I recognised your username! In case Jaruzel's too shy to mention it, he wrote a Gopher browser for Windows. If you're reading this thread because you're interested in small web topics (Gopher, Gemini, Tilde.Town, NetSurf, alt browsers) then you might like his browser too. It was my gateway into Gopher. http://www.jaruzel.com/gopher/gopher-client-browser-for-windows http://www.jaruzel.com/gopher/gopher-client-browser-for-wind...
  - Jaruzel 6y ago
    Aww Shucks. Thank you!