Re: Automatically Update Your Software?

On Wed, 09 Apr 2008 08:44:16 -0400, PeterD <peter2@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Tue, 8 Apr 2008 21:55:48 -0400, "Kevin Provance"
<casey@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

1) My programs offer an automatic check for updates at startup, plus gives
the user an option to manually check whenever the mood strikes them.

2A) Depends on the failure. If the website is down it ignores this and says
something to the effect of "data unavailable..try again later" if checked
manually. Automatic checks don't display anything. Otherwise standard
error trapping applies.

2B) Notified of what specifically? Failures? Once should be sufficent.
That an update is available? At each check would be enough.

While it's wise to give the user the option to opt out of auotmatic checking
for new versions, giving them the ability to shut off being notified of a
new version when checking is enabled would be pointless. If they want to
decline the update, that's fine, but declining should not turn off the
feature unless you specify this. The point is to get them to update.

There are two ways to go about this: Check at startup and download the
update at that time. My component will end the program and install the new
version and restart it making it fairly seamless. The other way is to check
for an update and download it silently and then let the user know an update
is available and can be installed immediately, or installed at shut down.
Pick whichever works best for you.

- Kev


Thanks Kev, that's almost exactly how I've got it setup right now.
(Our automatic check, when turned on, checks weekly, though I'd like
to change it to just check on startup...)

My users were running Citrix workstations, i.e. Windows via a Citrix
server. My main VB program was launched by a small trigger program
that checked periodically (timer) whether there was an updated version
available. If there was an update pending and no users detected, then
the update happened silently. The trigger could overwrite the main
prog's .exe no problem. In most cases the update did not affect the
users' method of working and so they were not informed. (I found the
less arrogance users pereceived from the computer "boffins", the
better it was all round.)

If a user had forgotten to log out at the end of the previous day,
thus keeping the .exe open, then the user would receive an internal
email-type message. This was when email was still in its infancy, so
the message may have got to them via UDP; I can't remember the details
now.

Generally the system worked very well, and all done with classic VB!
(VB5 in those days)

MM
.

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