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 Entire forum ➜ MUSHclient ➜ Tips and tricks ➜ How to install MUSHclient on Windows 7

How to install MUSHclient on Windows 7

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Posted by Nick Gammon   Australia  (23,097 posts)  Bio   Forum Administrator
Date Wed 11 Nov 2009 03:50 AM (UTC)

Amended on Tue 19 Aug 2014 08:48 PM (UTC) by Nick Gammon

Message

This walkthrough shows how to get MUSHclient going under Windows 7 (similar remarks probably apply to Vista too).

The normal installer puts writable files (like world file and log file directories) into a place it shouldn't, namely the Program Files directory, which is now protected. Until the installer is updated you can follow this post to get MUSHclient going anyway.

First, download the standalone zip file from http://www.gammon.com.au/files/mushclient/MUSHclient_4.43.zip (3.2 Mb).

[EDIT] More recently, download http://www.gammon.com.au/files/mushclient/MUSHclient_4.94.zip (4.6 Mb). However the rest of the instructions should be much the same.

I put the download into my Users folder, but wherever it got downloaded, you should see it like this:

Double-click the "MUSHclient_4.43" folder to open it, you will see a single directory, like this:

Copy that folder somewhere - I put it on my desktop, like this:

Double-click to open and you will see the MUSHclient program, support folders, and other useful files:

(Optional)

You can make a shortcut in your Start menu, by simply dragging the MUSHclient icon (the yellow icon that looks like Aladdin's lamp) directly onto your Start menu button (bottom left-hand corner of the Windows window). Then when you click on the start menu, there it is:

Now you can start MUSHclient, either from the Start menu if you made a shortcut as I just described, or by double-clicking the MUSHclient icon in the folder you just copied.

It should now start up, and amongst other things, display a message about help not being available. This is because the help file was designed for earlier versions of Windows:

(Optional)

You can install the WinHelp.exe program by following the link shown, and choose to get it for Windows 7:

After a bit of mucking around validating your copy of Windows, you can download WinHelp:

Once that is downloaded, install it, and then the help function will work normally.

All working!

It should now work, like this:

You may find if you go to save a world file it will try to put it into My Documents. This is OK, but you can navigate back to the "worlds" subfolders of the MUSHclient folder. That might be more convenient.


- Nick Gammon

www.gammon.com.au, www.mushclient.com
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Posted by WillFa   USA  (525 posts)  Bio
Date Reply #1 on Wed 11 Nov 2009 04:30 AM (UTC)

Amended on Wed 11 Nov 2009 04:35 AM (UTC) by WillFa

Message
If you've made the shortcut in your start menu, right click on it, and change the Start In directory to C:\Users\<My acct>\Documents

Once you've started Mushclient, I highly recommend pressing CTRL+ALT+G.

On the Worlds tab, Click the Default Worlds Directory button and change the path to something in C:\Users\<My Account>\Documents.

On the Logging tab, Click the Default Log File Directory button and change the path to something in C:\Users\<My Account>\Documents.

On the Plugins tab, Click the Plugins Directory button and change the path to something in C:\Users\<My Account>\Documents. I'd recommend copying the default plugins folder (...\MushClient\Worlds\Plugins) to your Documents directory as well.



Windows 7 will hide the files from you anytime an app tries to write to "C:\Program Files\" or "C:\Documents and Settings" and put them under C:\Users\<My Acct>\AppData\Local\VirtualStore\...

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Posted by Nick Gammon   Australia  (23,097 posts)  Bio   Forum Administrator
Date Reply #2 on Wed 11 Nov 2009 04:49 AM (UTC)

Amended on Wed 11 Nov 2009 05:03 AM (UTC) by Nick Gammon

Message
WillFa said:

On the Worlds tab, Click the Default Worlds Directory button and change the path to something in C:\Users\<My Account>\Documents.

On the Logging tab, Click the Default Log File Directory button and change the path to something in C:\Users\<My Account>\Documents.

On the Plugins tab, Click the Plugins Directory button and change the path to something in C:\Users\<My Account>\Documents. I'd recommend copying the default plugins folder (...\MushClient\Worlds\Plugins) to your Documents directory as well.


In other words:

Worlds (default): C:\Users\<My Account>\Documents\MUSHclient\worlds
Logging (default): C:\Users\<My Account>\Documents\MUSHclient\logs
Plugins (default): C:\Users\<My Account>\Documents\MUSHclient\plugins

... where <My Account> is obviously your account name.

Thanks, Willfa for the clarification.

Also, you can double-click the Dina font file to install that. That is a great font to use for mudding.


- Nick Gammon

www.gammon.com.au, www.mushclient.com
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Posted by Nick Gammon   Australia  (23,097 posts)  Bio   Forum Administrator
Date Reply #3 on Wed 11 Nov 2009 04:58 AM (UTC)
Message

This screen shot illustrates the idea for the world files:

I made a "MUSHclient" folder inside the Documents folder, and inside that I created "logs", "worlds", and "plugins". Then it was a case of using the Global Preferences to make those the default directories for logging, worlds, and plugins (you need to go to three different tabs to do that).

BTW, very confusingly, Windows shows the Documents folder as "My Documents" in the folder picker window, but shows it as "Documents" when you make your choice. Why do they do that? I mean, why isn't "Downloads" shown as "My Downloads"?


- Nick Gammon

www.gammon.com.au, www.mushclient.com
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Posted by WillFa   USA  (525 posts)  Bio
Date Reply #4 on Wed 11 Nov 2009 05:52 AM (UTC)

Amended on Wed 11 Nov 2009 05:53 AM (UTC) by WillFa

Message
Nick Gammon said:

BTW, very confusingly, Windows shows the Documents folder as "My Documents" in the folder picker window, but shows it as "Documents" when you make your choice. Why do they do that? I mean, why isn't "Downloads" shown as "My Downloads"?


Inside explorer, if you right click on the "My Documents" folder in explorer (the Documents folder is hidden) you'll notice you have an extra tab, "Location" that refers back to the documents directory. There's a shell special extension set up for these folders. (Incidentally, XP needed the attributes on the directory to be Read-only, hidden, and system for shell extensions to work... this doesn't seem to be the case anymore)


If you open up a cmd prompt, and do a "dir /a" in your profile directory. You'll see that Win 7 makes a bunch of junctions for the old XP paths. If you check "cacls Documents" and 'cacls "My Documents"' you'll see that the permissions on My Documents are rather funky and that everyone has Deny read access. This is just more hokey stuff MS did to move the folder to one without an annoying space in the name, and not break every old app.


And "My Downloads" doesn't exist because it was never there in XP, so there's no need to preserve backwards compatibility.
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Posted by Nick Gammon   Australia  (23,097 posts)  Bio   Forum Administrator
Date Reply #5 on Wed 11 Nov 2009 07:52 AM (UTC)
Message
Perhaps. All I am saying is, it is confusing. If I use the file picker and choose a directory called, say, "uploads", I don't expect to find I have put my documents in "downloads".

This is similar to the comments in another thread, where you could put log files in C:\Program Files\MUSHclient\logs and then open that directory and not find them.

I suggest that in this case, the file picker should refuse to let you choose, for the purposes of making an output file, one where it has no intention of putting it.

My basic trust in getting what I think I am getting is being eroded.

- Nick Gammon

www.gammon.com.au, www.mushclient.com
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Posted by Hanaisse   Canada  (114 posts)  Bio
Date Reply #6 on Wed 11 Nov 2009 02:37 PM (UTC)
Message
You think you're confused? At least you have a better than basic programming knowledge. Most of us know simply to 'point and click'. :)

Anyway, before I rant, I have been thinking of upgrading XP to Win7 so I thank you for taking the time to show us how to at least get MushClient working. I'm understanding the point about no longer being able to write to files in Program Files and even though that will be a big adjustment for me I guess I can live with it.

I am a little confused and have a question about what you did higher up in the process. After you downloaded the file and double-clicked it (Win7 has a built in zip/unzip now? does it do tar too?) why did you put the MushClient folder on your desktop and decide to run it from there? I guess it works and it's not really wrong but shouldn't it be in Program Files where it usually is? Are you saying not to put it there even though you've explained how to change the writable files required? Could you even leave it where you downloaded it? I'm asking because I prefer a clean desktop and would rather not clutter it with something I'm never going to access like an entire folder.

And I agree with you on the "Downloads" vs. "My Downloads" point. Call it one thing, keep it simple.

Nick Gammon said:
I suggest that in this case, the file picker should refuse to let you choose, for the purposes of making an output file, one where it has no intention of putting it.

Definately makes sense. Hey, maybe Windows 943 can be your idea!

aka: Hana
Owner in Training of: Fury of the Gods
alm-dev.org:4000
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Posted by Nick Gammon   Australia  (23,097 posts)  Bio   Forum Administrator
Date Reply #7 on Wed 11 Nov 2009 06:59 PM (UTC)
Message
Hanaisse said:

I am a little confused and have a question about what you did higher up in the process. After you downloaded the file and double-clicked it (Win7 has a built in zip/unzip now? does it do tar too?) why did you put the MushClient folder on your desktop and decide to run it from there? I guess it works and it's not really wrong but shouldn't it be in Program Files where it usually is?


It has a built-in unzipper (I think XP does too). So, you can just open a .zip file without installing WinZip. However a quick test shows that .tgz and .tar files are not recognised (however WinZip recognizes those).

As for the location, you really have a couple of options:


  • Keep everything together in the traditional way. In that case, you need to put the MUSHclient folder somewhere writable, which excludes Program Files. I used the Desktop, but you could also put it somewhere in My Documents (or Documents as it seems to be called now).

  • Split things up into non-writable and writable parts. In that case, you could put the main install into Program Files (I think the standard installer would do that anyway), and then move the "worlds", "logs", and "plugins" folders into your Documents folder.


If you put everything into one place, eg. the Desktop, or your Documents folder, then you don't really need to change the "Start In" location of MUSHclient (as Willfa suggested) because that is writable anyway. The Start In location needs to be writable because it writes the global preferences file there (and also saves your world positions into a file called MUSHclient.ini).

- Nick Gammon

www.gammon.com.au, www.mushclient.com
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Posted by WillFa   USA  (525 posts)  Bio
Date Reply #8 on Wed 11 Nov 2009 09:42 PM (UTC)

Amended on Wed 11 Nov 2009 09:43 PM (UTC) by WillFa

Message
The "Compressed Folders" shell extension first appeared in Win2k. It handles zips and cabs.

7-zip is free, open source software that handles 7 types of compression.
Supported formats:
* Packing / unpacking: 7z, ZIP, GZIP, BZIP2 and TAR
* Unpacking only: ARJ, CAB, CHM, CPIO, DEB, DMG, HFS, ISO, LZH, LZMA, MSI, NSIS, RAR, RPM, UDF, WIM, XAR and Z.

www.7-zip.org

(So don't pay for winzip)
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Posted by Hanaisse   Canada  (114 posts)  Bio
Date Reply #9 on Wed 11 Nov 2009 10:04 PM (UTC)
Message
Ah, I use WinRAR so I never noticed.

Thanks again to both of you for taking the time to post this.

aka: Hana
Owner in Training of: Fury of the Gods
alm-dev.org:4000
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Posted by Nick Gammon   Australia  (23,097 posts)  Bio   Forum Administrator
Date Reply #10 on Thu 12 Nov 2009 01:33 AM (UTC)
Message
WillFa said:

7-zip is free, open source software that handles 7 types of compression.

...

www.7-zip.org


Aha - you learn something new every day. Thanks!

- Nick Gammon

www.gammon.com.au, www.mushclient.com
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Posted by Larkin   (278 posts)  Bio
Date Reply #11 on Mon 16 Nov 2009 10:54 AM (UTC)
Message
The first thing I installed on my shiny new Windows 7 was MUSHclient. I have never used C:\Program Files\MUSHclient for storing my data, however, so I completely circumvented the whole UAC thing without even realizing it.

All I really needed was to change the target working directory for my shortcut to the directory on my flash drive where I keep all my files. I changed my global preference for the world files directory a non-Program Files directory (not even the same as my new working directory), and everything's been working great.

I'm running 64-bit Windows 7 Home Premium.
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Posted by YmerejO42   USA  (25 posts)  Bio
Date Reply #12 on Thu 17 Dec 2009 02:58 PM (UTC)
Message
If anyone would like, I can create a NSIS-based installer for MUSHclient that will install it in, let's say, "C:\Games" which will also bypass all of these steps. Honestly, that's where I install all games anyway, so I had never realized it was an issue.

On a side note, Nick, how hard would it be to change the source so that it stores all user-based files in <account>\Documents\Games? That would also make it much much easier to use on multi-user computers (such as mine).

If you can do this, please, PLEASE don't hard-code the location of that folder. I have my Documents folder stored on a separate drive from my Windows install, specifically because that way if my Windows drive dies, I lose absolutely nothing. Windows knows where it is, though, and sets environment variables accordingly.
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Posted by Shadowfyr   USA  (1,788 posts)  Bio
Date Reply #13 on Thu 17 Dec 2009 03:21 PM (UTC)
Message
I love how various versions of windows often had trouble figuring out where *they* where, never mind anything else, yet every recent version requires that we place more and more trust in it knowing where other things are, via symbolic links from places they are not... Seriously, this is a pain in the backside. And, yeah, I agree with the whole "put stuff in 'games'" thing. You know how many fracking games have stuff like "override" folders, where you place mods? A bloody huge mess of them. Win Vista and 7 torpedo modding like that completely, if you are stupid enough to put them in Program Files, since you **must** have access to the program directories to install the bloody mods. What a damn mess, and all as some lame ass "security" solution that probably doesn't succeed in making the machine truly more secure.
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Posted by YmerejO42   USA  (25 posts)  Bio
Date Reply #14 on Thu 17 Dec 2009 04:06 PM (UTC)
Message
Well, some newer games (Torchlight comes to mind) put their Mod folder in your documents, and sites where you download mods make it quite clear where that is. Makes life a lot easier all the way around. I'm not sure what I'd have done with Fallout 3, though, if I'd installed it in my Program Files directory.
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