Before deploying your plugin to end-users, you will need to obtain a AIM Plugin Deployment Key from developer.aim.com, and specify this deployment key for the UUID for your class. To simplify things, you can set up different build configurations with the development and deployment keys; for example, you could have a "Debug" configuration with the development key and a "Release" configuration with the deployment key.
Once you have built a "Release" version of your plugin, you will need to generate a fingerprint for your plugin DLL using the acchash.exe tool found in the devtools folder in the SDK. Once you have generated the fingerprint, add the hexadecimal value returned from acchash.exe to your plugin deployment key on the developer.aim.com website. This helps ensure that nobody else can use your deployment key.

At this point your plugin DLL is now ready to be distributed to users' machines. For convenience, we have included an NSIS install script that will take your DLL and install and register it on users' machines. To compile the NSIS script you will need to go to download the latest NSIS build. You can use Notepad to open PluginInstallExample_Cpp.nsi to make modifications specific to your plugin in the script. Once you have finished tweaking the script, compile it with NSIS and the resulting .exe is what you will need to post for users to download. Congratulations, you have just built and deployed your first plugin!
NOTE: If you would like to build your own installer, you need to register the dll on the user's machine by calling regsvr32 with the dll name. See the NSIS script for an example.
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Last updated: 03/17/2007