Jump to content

MultiEx Commander

Edit links
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Theageofchaos (talk | contribs) at 21:41, 15 June 2012. The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.
MultiEx Commander
Developer(s)Mike Zuurman
Initial releasev1.07, (August 16, 1999) [1]
Stable release
4.5.0 [2] / January 22, 2011; 14 years ago (2011-01-22)
Preview release
None / None
Written inVisual Basic
Operating systemWindows
TypeFile manager
LicenseShareware (Windows)
Websitemultiex.xentax.com

MultiEx Commander is a game resource archive manager for Windows. Some features include a built-in MexScript (AKA BMS) interpreter, file extractor and importer, stand alone mod creator EasyMod.

This application is currently written by Mike Zuurman in Visual Basic[3]. The first versions of the program were written in Borland Turbo C in 1998 and 1999 as user interface for a command line DOS archiving tool, called multiex, that was created in 1997[4]. The program is extensible by programmers via a plugin-API. The first multiex release was built around MexScript, a custom script written specifically to enable programmers to process (game) archives by simply typing a few lines of script. All the low-level events would be carried out by the main program. MexScript (or BMS as it is also called, after Binary MultiEx Script[5]) is still a prominent feature of the tool, as the user can write scripts via the built-in script window[6]. It also enables the use of QuickBMS scripts, a later improvement (or "forking") of the original MexScript.

Additionally, MultiEx Commander can create stand-alone mods for games via the EasyMod creator. Custom changes made to certain game archives (such as sounds, or textures) are stored as a stand alone program, enabling users to distribute their mods without others needing MultiEx Commander.

The Windows version is donateware: users can download it after they donate a certain amount to the Xentax Foundation (currently $10). After that, they can download it and use it indefinitely[7].

History

In 1997 the command line MexScript bases game archive extraction and importation tool multiex.exe for DOS was programmed using Turbo C. From 1998 through 2001 MultiEx Commander was created as a GUI for multiex.exe with new versions[8]. One can still see the last DOS version (2.3) in action in this video, a version that was released on February 23rd 2001[9]. In that same year, the first Windows version was released (3.0b) along with a number of updates to higher versions[10], a task Mike Zuurman first discussed with fellow programmers.[11]. Version 4 was released on June 29th 2004[12][13] The current version is 4.5.0 that has approval of Duke Nukem (as acted by original Duke Nukem voice actor Jon St. John)[14].


References

  1. ^ "readme.txt". 1999-08-19. Retrieved 2012-06-15.
  2. ^ "MultiEx Commander readme.txt". xentax.com. 2011-01-17. Retrieved 2012-06-15.
  3. ^ http://sourceforge.net/projects/mexcom/
  4. ^ http://www.xentax.com/downloads/multiex/MexComManual.pdf
  5. ^ http://forum.xentax.com/viewtopic.php?t=399
  6. ^ http://www.xentax.com/downloads/multiex/MexComManual.pdf
  7. ^ http://multiex.xentax.com/
  8. ^ http://web.archive.org/web/20000117034404/http://www.xs4all.nl/~michael/multiex.html
  9. ^ http://web.archive.org/web/20010708000945/http://www.xentax.com/html/multiex-downloads.htm
  10. ^ http://web.archive.org/web/20010708000945/http://www.xentax.com/html/multiex-downloads.htm
  11. ^ http://www.gamedev.net/topic/8629-please-some-feedback-would-be-welcome/
  12. ^ http://tweakers.net/meuktracker/6602/multiex-commander-400b.html
  13. ^ http://www.xentax.com/?p=77
  14. ^ http://www.xentax.com/audio/jsj_xentax_md1.mp3
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=MultiEx_Commander&oldid=497778814"