A scripting language that can create a small, independent, Windows EXE?

Question

I would like to do a little data processing - a little binary data processing, followed by conversion to serialization of the text. The result is written to a file and processed by an external program (executed by my program). Data processing is more than I would like to consider in batch files.

I would prefer to use a scripting language, but should not install the language first. The target computers are mostly old Windows windows that are offline (without updates such as PowerShell)

I am not familiar with various language tools for creating .exe files. Who has solutions that work well and do not produce huge files? (i.e. package of the entire interpreter plus my script.)

Answer 1

For my money (free) AutoIt 3 is exactly what you are looking for. AutoIt produces relatively (250 thousand standard overhead) small stand-alone exes. It has full Perl as a regular expression engine, so your light processing should be a breeze (I myself wrote some pretty heavy data processing scripts). When autoit loads , be sure to get the full version, including Scite, which makes compilation for a one-click operation.

Answer 2

I know that I can get a flame for this, but VB 6 is a viable option. Starting with XP SP2 (I think maybe earlier), Windows came with a set runtime. Not sure about the prospects.

Also used is the Windows Scripting Host, which uses VBScript and JScript. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Script_Host

Answer 3

Lua is a great choice for this kind of thing. You can integrate it into your executable file or use the standalone Lua interpreter to run your scripts.

Answer 4

While waiting for answers, I came across Shoes that can make Ruby.exe (I am most familiar with Ruby). I worked mainly, although the size of 2.4 MB was slightly larger than I would like. However, I found that it will work when the focus of the application changes.

I switched to a "normal" terminal script and found rubyscript2exe , which after working on a problem with rubygems , seems to work, and creates a ~ 700 kb file.

I liked some of the options presented, but at the moment this should not be redone.

Answer 5

Python with py2exe , Depends on what you mean by a small one, though.

Answer 6

Why not crash a .NET application? There are free editions of the IDE, and the Framework comes with Windows as a standard component (which also includes the C # compiler, as it happens).

Answer 7

Using a PowerShell script will be what you reviewed. Data processing may be richer.