Publishing::: ClickOnce or Windows Installer

Question

Hi, While publishing, how can I select ClickOnce or Windows Installer. Where can the choice be made? Thanks Furqan

Answer 1

You can setup clickonce deployment in your applications properties page. Right click your project in solution explorer and select properties. For windows installer you need to create a new windows setup project.

Both are pretty easy:

clickonce: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms228283(VS.80).aspx

Setup and deployment project: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/k3bb4tfd%28VS.80%29.aspx

Answer 2

If you want to create an MSI, I would recommend using WiX.

The downside to the VS Deployment Projects is that they require Visual Studio to build (which should be unnecessary on a CI build server).

WiX has a bit more of a learning curve (and the odd gotcha too), but is much easier in the long run. Lots of online resources, including the WiX category here at StackOverflow.