ClickOnce Question
I have a project that has two parts: 1) Server 2) Client GUI
I will be giving the server to my customers, and it is up to them to distribute the Client GUI to their own customers. Is it possible to publish the Client GUI using ClickOnce, then have my customer provide the server for download/installation of the GUI. Obviously I will not be able to specify an installation URL for every one of my customers, so I am looking for a way for them edit a file so they can customize the ClickOnce to look for their own server. Is this possible?
[565 byte] By [
RWF] at [2007-12-23]
The hosting customer will have to have a publisher certificate of their own to re-sign the manifests. They can use the mageui.exe or mage.exe tools in the .NET SDK to open and edit the deployment manifest (.application file) to update the deployment provider URL (labeled Installation URL in Visual Studio and Start Location in Mageui.exe), then when they save they sign with their publisher cert.
I'm in the same situation at present and also thought about Mage.exe, but I'm not sure if this tool is available on every .Net installation (As it is not installed to the Framework folder but to the SDK folder of VS).
So I wonder if I can rely on the Mage.exe way. Does anybody have new informations about that?
* ClickOnce apps MUST be signed.
* Mage.exe and MageUI.exe are part of the .Net SDK only, and thus not installed with netfx. So it is very unconvinient to rely on Mage. However mage.exe is built using the msbuild parts of the .net framework, so it is possible to create your own mage tool. (You are not allowed to distribute only the mage tool, you have to distribute the SDK in complete shape.)
Does anyone at MS have a recommended way of doing this? The deployment manifest will change at every customer installation (DeploymentURL etc) and then the deployment manifest (.application) MUST be resigned with a cert. I know you can sign files with the msbuild task SignFile (msbuild is part of netfx) but that only takes a cert thumbprint, not a cert. What is the recommended way?
I am still struggling with this. I am not sure about this, but I was wondering what happens if I create the deployment files by setting the "Where will the users install the application from property" To CD-ROM or DVD-ROM. I guess in that case, we don't have a URL set and then just copy the files over to the web folder and manually point the installation link to that location. Let me know what you guys think. Thanks.
