Yes. But the article states that they don’t care about that. They just want a single executable.

I never understood the need for a single executable on windows when folders, zip files, and 100% free installers exist if you don’t like zip files. Also nearly all of the gui kits he’s shooting down have ways to build custom components if that’s what you want to do.

No need for an installer when it's just one file you can run anywhere. And folders/zips are way too hard for the average user. Ask me how I know. My partner gave up an entire game platform because it was delivered as a .7z file they could not figure out.

But a .7z requires a custom expander, .zip is natively supported by windows, isn't it?

.7z recently got native support.

None of these help you if you are dealing with users that move executables for convenient access or think updating the sofware just involves dragging and dropping the new executable into the existing installation folder. Customer support had countless stories like that.

Does using something like APE by jart work? It's a single executable that's also a zipfile. (I assume a replaceable .dll inside the archive is LGPL compliant) I know it's a bit of a tangent, but on platforms like macos the "apps" are all directories with the .app extension, and that doesn't seem to cause issues.

Then pay for a license or make the object files available to users who want to relink the app.