Electron-packager: Set product name, file description copyright on Windows

[Ivshti]

Currently the .exe is branded as "Electron" and that shows up when right-clicking the app in the task bar, the task manager and several other key places.

This should be implemented in electron-packager as soon as the issue is resolved in rcedit and node-rcedit, because they currently cannot change those resources (CompanyName, FileDescription, LegalCopyright, ProductName).

I'll keep you posted on this.

[junosuarez]

Cross-referencing those issues:

• https://github.com/atom/rcedit/issues/2
• https://github.com/mllrsohn/node-webkit-builder/issues/44

[junosuarez]

I found this wrapper to resourcehacker, which is probably the most robust solution for modifying compilied Windows executables https://github.com/felicienfrancois/node-resourcehacker

We may be able to swap out rcedit for this instead.

[Rameshv]

@jden +1 for https://github.com/felicienfrancois/node-resourcehacker sounds like a good alternative. is anybody working on that..??

[junosuarez]

@Rameshv after looking at that repo again, it doesn't appear to be a properly licensed redistribution of resourcehacker... indeed, it's not published on npm. We might be able to make a version of that which downloaded the resourcehacker exe via an npm postinstall script from the original distribution point

[Rameshv]

@jden yep thats my concern too. I made a quick fix by implementing the npm postinstall hook asyou suggested. You can see the PR here https://github.com/felicienfrancois/node-resourcehacker/pull/3. Waiting for the response from the author on this.

Let me know if this works.

[felicienfrancois]

rcedit works pretty well and can do that (I use grunt-rcedit on my electron app).
This is not well documented but all thoose strings are "version-strings".

$ rcedit "path-to-exe" --set-version-string "CompanyName" "MyCompany"
$ rcedit "path-to-exe" --set-version-string "FileDescription" "This is an exe"
$ rcedit "path-to-exe" --set-version-string "LegalCopyright" "Copyright whatever"
$ rcedit "path-to-exe" --set-version-string "ProductName" "MyAwesomeProduct"

To get all the possible keys, you can open the exe with a gui program like resourcehacker or winresourcer

PS: I found this on the grunt-rcedit doc

[Rameshv]

ah cool, thanks @felicienfrancois . yep rcedit works just fine with the version string info.. thanks for the hint.. it saved my day

[Rameshv]

hi @Ivshti , with this https://github.com/maxogden/electron-packager/pull/63 merge, you can do this now.. check the readme for more info

[alexwarren]

We can now change the version info in resources successfully, but this does _not_ affect the name that appears when you right-click the app in the task bar. It still shows up as "Electron" there even if you change all the resource names.

[s-a]

This is true. Any ideas regarding @alexwarren 's problem? Maybe this one should be a new issue?

[felicienfrancois]

@alexwarren @s-a
Windows title is handled by electron runtime.

It means that you have to set the title in your code when creating a BrowserWindow
https://github.com/atom/electron/blob/master/docs/api/browser-window.md#new-browserwindowoptions

Same for the icon, you have to set the runtime icon (ie window titlebar and runtime taskbar icon) when creating a BrowserWindow

[s-a]

@felicienfrancois this is not what we mean. BrowserWindow setup is the same as when I set document.title. We talk about the Windows task bar menu item caption.

[felicienfrancois]

@s-a ok sorry.

It seems the name in the taskbar depends if it have been pined and how:

• If not pined, it depends on the runtime. Seems to be not consistant across electron versions. Maybe the undocumented "productName" entry of package.json could do the trick.
• If pined by dragging a shortcut, it keeps the name of the shortcut
• If pined by dragging the exe, it keeps the name of the exe
• If pined by right click > Pin when the program was running, it keeps the name at this time.

It may also depends on the OS. Windows 10 has changed things. there is an open issue regarding pining on windows 10 https://github.com/atom/electron/issues/1954

[malept]

Closing since #63 was merged.