Windows 7 build

[sergeevabc]

Dear @MilesCranmer,

rip2 does not work on Windows 7, because Rust team betrayed us (Windows 7 users) and changed their compiler so that the binaries do not work on that OS by default. However, there is a workaround. Please, check if you can use it.

[MilesCranmer]

Just to confirm, are you able to install from source using cargo?

[sergeevabc]

Err… Sorry, Miles, you probably have in mind some Rust way of compiling the source code, but I'm an ordinary user who doesn't understand this.

[MilesCranmer]

Ah, sorry. No worries. I'll see what I can do.

[BradKML]

Help out here as well, like they are all Rust but at the same time apt was insufficient to cover them all. skim-rs/skim#293 skim-rs/skim#769

[MilesCranmer]

I don't think I will sadly ever get a chance to do Windows 7 releases for rip2 since I don't have an easy way to test it and it seems rust isn't keen to support Windows 7 either.

It should possible to compile manually which is probably the best workaround. Unless someone who uses Windows 7 is willing to put the effort in to help.

Here's a script my LLM wrote which you could test (again, I don't have a way to test this myself though, so I have no clue if this will work). You should be able to just paste this into PowerShell -

# 1. Download rustup-init.exe
$exe = "$env:TEMP\rustup-init.exe"
Invoke-WebRequest -Uri "https://static.rust-lang.org/rustup/dist/x86_64-pc-windows-msvc/rustup-init.exe" -OutFile $exe

# 2. Install rustup silently with stable toolchain (host = normal MSVC)
& $exe -y --default-host x86_64-pc-windows-msvc --default-toolchain stable
Remove-Item $exe

# 3. Reload environment for this session
function Reload-Env {
  $envVars = [Environment]::GetEnvironmentVariables("User")
  foreach ($key in $envVars.Keys) {
    [Environment]::SetEnvironmentVariable($key, $envVars[$key], "Process")
  }
}
Reload-Env

# 4. Add the Windows 7 MSVC target (may need nightly if stable doesn’t include it)
rustup target add x86_64-win7-windows-msvc

# 5. Confirm
rustc --version
cargo --version
rustup --version

# 6. Install rip2 (built for your default host, or override with --target if you want Win7 artifacts)
cargo install rip2

Assuming all goes well this should build a "rip2" binary to your machine. Apart from that I just don't have a way to test this stuff, sorry.