autorun vcd's with bundled software

[shearn]

Hi,

In the past I've used Roxio WinOnCD for making VCDs and it has a very neat function which allows you to include a software VCD player on the CD, so if the user doesn't have the software to play VCDs, it will use the software included, without having to install anything.

Now, I don't use WinOnCD anymore, I use Pinnacle Studio 8. The question is: Does anyone know how to bundle VCD software onto a VCD such that it autoplays on a computer with no VCD software?

Thanks.

Simon

[adam]

If you don't need menu support than you can do this very easily with Media Player classic, which is free. Make a directory called MPlay and put the exe file in there. Then in the root of your disk, make a text file and type:

[autorun]
OPEN=MPLAY\MPLAY.EXE /fullscreen /cd

and then save it as autorun.inf

When you insert the disk in the pc, as long as autoplay is enabled, then the first track will just start playing by itself. If autoplay is disabled then you have to browse the disk, run the exe, and hit file/open cd.

There are lots of other commands which you can add to your autorun script as well, and they are listed in the help section of media player classic.

[shearn]

Thanks, I'll take a look at that.
What if I want menu support? I take it Media Player Classic doesn't support menus, is there another option?

Simon,

[adam]

It has menu support for DVDs but I don't know about VCDs. Reading the list of command strings it says using the /cd function will load all tracks. That doesn't sound like it would support menu's in that way, but you'd have to try it out yourself.

I don't know of any other software that can do this but there is no reason why you can't take the files off of another one of your autorun VCDs and use those on another. Just copy over the player and any relevent other files to the same locations on your new disk. I assume WinONCD used an autorun.inf script to load the player, so just edit the document if necessary to match your new disk.