is it easy to add the same hyper-link to the icon that you put on the name? Any reason not to?

No good reason comes to mind. It's now implemented.

Thanks, Stephan! Is there a compiled Windows version somewhere or do I wait until the next release (in October)? I haven't built fossil before though I have downloaded the source tarball.

Never mind.I got it, compiled it, and tested it. Clicking on the icon works like a charm! Thank you.

Is there a compiled Windows version somewhere ...

Not on the fossil site.

... or do I wait until the next release (in October)?

We always recommend that users work from the trunk version. The developers do and this web site is generally hosted on something very close to trunk.

There are (terse) instructions on how to build for Windows at https://fossil-scm.org/home/wiki?name=Release+Build+How-To. All of the build tools are free. It isn't hard. It does not require a lot of dependencies nor a lot of installation. You will need only:

• MSVC Community Edition. (Select C++ development when installing)
• OpenSSL ← only required if you want Fossil to be able to support TLS
• Strawberry Perl ← Needed to build OpenSSL from sources. Not used by Fossil.
• Fossil sources

(Edit: Revised to better explain what each dependency.)

At what stage(s) in the build process is Strawberry Perl required? As I understand the Build Howto documentation, Strawberry Perl is required only for setting up OpenSSL. Or is Perl used elsewhere in the Fossil setup as well?

OpenSSL only.

Fossil does not use Perl in any way. Perl is only required in order to build OpenSSL from sources.

I've made the effort of going through this afresh on a new machine (just 4 GB of RAM), as my usual development horse had been long set up. It worked flawlessly. Most of the time is of course spent on the one-time setup: MSVC¹, Perl, and especially 25 min on compiling OpenSSL² (but you will not do this too often). Fossil itself compiled in under two minutes.

So, it works and it does not even require one to be a programmer. Caveat: you do need admin rights, though.

1. ^{^} If you don't need the full VS, you can get just the Tools (when the installer starts, select "Desktop development with C++" only).
2. ^{^} Drops down to 15 min on my 12 GB machine.

Most of the time is of course spent on the one-time setup

You can eliminate this by using MinGW instead of MSVC: just run this CMD/BAT script and about five minutes you will have fossil.exe.

@echo off
set MSYS2_URL=https://repo.msys2.org/distrib/
set MSYS2_SFX=msys2-x86_64-latest.sfx.exe
set DEPENDS=make mingw-w64-x86_64-openssl mingw-w64-x86_64-gcc
set MAKE_ARGS=FOSSIL_ENABLE_SSL=1 LIB="-s -Wl,-Bstatic -lssl -lcrypto -Wl,-Bdynamic -lmingwex -lz -lws2_32"
if not exist "%MSYS2_SFX%" where curl.exe && curl.exe "%MSYS2_URL%%MSYS2_SFX%" -o"%MSYS2_SFX%" || powershell -Command (New-Object System.Net.WebClient^).DownloadFile('"%MSYS2_URL%%MSYS2_SFX%"','"%MSYS2_SFX%"'^)
if not exist msys64 ("%MSYS2_SFX%" || exit)
set PATH=%~dp0msys64\mingw64\bin;%~dp0msys64\usr\bin
if not exist msys64\etc\pacman.d\gnupg (bash.exe --login -c exit || exit)
pacman.exe -Qq -k %DEPENDS% || (pacman.exe --noconfirm -Sqyuu && pacman.exe --noconfirm -Sqyuu --needed %DEPENDS%)
if not exist fossil.tar.gz (curl.exe https://fossil-scm.org/home/tarball/fossil.tar.gz -ofossil.tar.gz || exit)
if not exist fossil (tar.exe -xzf fossil.tar.gz || exit)
make.exe -C fossil -f win\Makefile.mingw %MAKE_ARGS% && move fossil\fossil.exe .

if not exist "%MSYS2_SFX%" powershell -Command (New-Object System.Net.WebClient^).DownloadFile...)

If on Windows 10 (recent enough), note that curl is now built-in:

C:\>where curl
C:\Windows\System32\curl.exe

C:\>C:\Windows\System32\curl.exe -V
curl 8.0.1 (Windows) libcurl/8.0.1 Schannel WinIDN
Release-Date: 2023-03-20
Protocols: dict file ftp ftps http https imap imaps pop3 pop3s smtp smtps telnet tftp
Features: AsynchDNS HSTS HTTPS-proxy IDN IPv6 Kerberos Largefile NTLM SPNEGO SSL SSPI threadsafe Unicode UnixSockets

Thanks for the suggestion. I have updated the script.

Also curl may be present on an older systems due to git and some other programs (I have ten curl.exe on my current machine).