What package of .Net framework is required on target client machine in order to run .Net winforms application?

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+2 Q:

What package of .Net framework is required on target client machine in order to run .Net winforms application?

I'm Trying to deploy my winforms project using installshield in order to make is available to be installed on other computers. My project is written under .net framework 3.5.

My question is : What version of .net package should be installed on the target machine in order to be able to run my project?

One thing to notice is that target machine is not connected to internet so I have to embed a standalone offline installer for .net framework.

Surely, with .Net framework 3.5 full redistributable package installed, my project runs fine. But it's ~200MB. Should I really install 200MB in order to run my ~10MB project on target machine?

one other option would be installing client redistributable package which I heard ~30MB. But I couldn't find any official release and am not sure if that's gonna work.

Any help would be appreciated.

+1 A:

You should deploy with the web installer so that it can determine what your client needs and download only those components. The full install is that big because it contains all variants of the framework for all possible systems (x86, x64, etc.).

This site from Scott Hanselman is an excellent resource on the matter of deploying .NET.

http://www.hanselman.com/smallestdotnet/

As it states on that site:

If you look for .NET Downloads on Microsoft's site, it might look like the .NET Framework is 200+ megs. It's not. Those big downloads are the Complete Offline Versions of every version of the .NET Framework for every kind of machine possible. The big .NET download includes x86, x64, and ia64. It includes .NET 2.0, 3.0, and 3.5 code for all systems all in one super-archive.

Jeff Yates 2010-08-31 17:31:52

I have mentioned in my first post that client machines are not connected to internet. so web installer is not a choice for me. Is there anyway I can determine what components are needed to be installed, so hat I can reduce the size of .net framework installer?

Kamyar 2010-08-31 18:18:20

@Kamyar: If you know that your clients will all be using a specific platform (e.g. x86), and you know what version of .NET they already have, then you could probably tailor an install to only include those components. But if you don't know, then you don't have much choice but to provide the full 200MB. That said, if you have to deploy without Internet anyway, why worry about the size of the installer? It's not installing that 200MB.

Jeff Yates 2010-08-31 20:21:57

Well, They all use windows xp sp2 so I guess they all have .net framework 2 installed. How can I tailor an install to include just the required components?

Kamyar 2010-09-02 08:29:22

@Kamyar: If you're deploying this in a non-Internet way, why can't you use the 200MB installer? I am confused as to the problem we're solving here.

Jeff Yates 2010-09-02 13:37:55

Well, people are not very friendly there. The PCs are very old. And I just wanted to see if there's a way to reduce the installation time and installer size.

Kamyar 2010-09-19 17:35:03

@Kamyar: When you install .NET from the web or the 200MB installer, it will take the same time (download time excluded) as it will only install what is needed.

Jeff Yates 2010-09-20 20:19:07

Thanks Jeff, didn't know that

Kamyar 2010-09-21 12:55:15

@Kamyar: You're welcome.

Jeff Yates 2010-09-21 15:42:50

ansaurus

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What package of .Net framework is required on target client machine in order to run .Net winforms application?

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