Autoupdating .net applications

Question

I've written 2 reasonably large scale apps in .net so far, and both of them have needed an updating facility to automatically update the application when I roll out new code.

I've found the 'Enterprise application block updater' a bit too complex for my needs, and I've found 'click once' frustrating when it comes to publishing.

The most adequate updating code I've found is the .net Application Updater Component, which I've used for both projects. I've had to modify it recently because it uses web dav, which isn't always installed on our web servers (it still needs directory browsing, however).

I'm surprised that there isn't more on the web about automatically updating applications, and was wondering whether people have had success with any other methods than the ones mentioned above?

Answer 1

At my company, we use a custom inhouse updater for our applications. It's embedded as as a resource in the main application executable and when the application needs to update, the updater is extracted, written to disk and launched to do the update. The updater can download a .msi and launch it or it can download a zip file and unzip it's content int the application folder. Pretty simple and effective.

Answer 2

See the answers to this similar question: a few auto-update frameworks were recommended there which are designed for (or work with) .net apps:

• Application Updater Block (which you mention)
• ClickOnce,
• ClickThrough

Answer 3

Try an off-the-shelf autoupdate product: http://www.AutoUpdatePlus.com