Comments on: Application Deployment Made Easy

By: Kevin Bost

Kevin Bost — Wed, 08 Sep 2021 20:34:15 +0000

In reply to Harrey.

Hi Harrey,

From looking into the Squirrel code, it will download it again (https://github.com/Squirrel/Squirrel.Windows/blob/76c87af6f389bea69576c738ef46574b2945b0ba/src/Squirrel/IUpdateManager.cs#L145-L182).

The UpdateApp method is the “Easy mode” option when using Squirrel. It is basically a simple wrapper around calling CheckForUpdate, DownloadReleases, and ApplyReleases. So if you want to apply the release that you have already downloaded the ApplyReleases method is what you are looking for.

You can find more info about it in the docs here: https://github.com/Squirrel/Squirrel.Windows/blob/76c87af6f389bea69576c738ef46574b2945b0ba/docs/using/update-manager.md

Happy coding.

By: Harrey

Harrey — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 11:02:23 +0000

Hey, have one query related to this like if we are using
await updateManager.DownloadReleases(applyLatestRelease);
and then after this,
updateManager.UpdateApp();
Then what will happened? Will “UpdateApp” method use the already downloaded update or download it again?

By: Kevin Bost

Kevin Bost — Tue, 26 May 2020 20:59:43 +0000

In reply to Royce Lithgo. Good clarification. I had somewhat assumed in my steps above that those commands were being run from a clean state (such as a CI pipeline). But yes, making sure you restrict it to only publish Release builds is what you want for any production work.

By: Royce Lithgo

Royce Lithgo — Tue, 11 Feb 2020 00:41:08 +0000

I wanted to package release builds only and had to modify the nuget pack command to include this parameter: -Prop Configuration=Release
Without this it was packaging the debug build of the 2 Assembly files but picking up the release build of the other files.

By: Kevin Bost

Kevin Bost — Mon, 28 Oct 2019 16:13:28 +0000

In reply to David Spector. This is an installer. So if you see it on your system it means that some application you have installed is using it to install. Squirrel itself has a very small footprint so it should not be consuming much space.

By: David Spector

David Spector — Mon, 28 Oct 2019 12:26:25 +0000

Update: According to https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/887297-what-is-the-squirreltemp-folder/, Squirrel is installed by Microsoft (or possibly some Microsoft app), so it can be safely ignored. I hope it doesn’t use up lots of disk space like “node/npm”.

By: David Spector

David Spector — Mon, 28 Oct 2019 12:20:26 +0000

This article doesn’t make the context clear, but this seems to be a Linux program. What’s it doing on my Windows 10 computer when I never installed it? Just curious.

By: Boris

Boris — Thu, 22 Aug 2019 17:52:22 +0000

Hello Kevin,
Thanks for the article. But you know how beginners using tutorials, copy-paste. This article contain two misspellings:
1. class name in xaml document,
2. Squirrell – name of command (it could be added in env vars as Paths value[../packages/squirrel.windows.x.x.x/tools])
Thanks!

By: samer saleh

samer saleh — Fri, 16 Aug 2019 23:05:44 +0000

Hi Kevin,
Thanks for the post. Have you ever tried to get the updates before launching the app to mimic clickonce? Supposedly this should work through update manager checkforupdates and restartApp methods as some post shows but I was never been able to get to work. If you were able to do it can you provide sample code? Thanks

By: Kevin Bost

Kevin Bost — Tue, 23 Jul 2019 16:09:19 +0000

In reply to Vlad.

Hi Vlad,

That code should go in the MainWindow.xaml.cs (code behind) file for the main Window.
It is an event handler so you will want to make sure you register it for the Loaded event. This is done in the MainWindow.xaml with this line: Loaded=”MainWindow_OnLoaded”

By: Vlad

Vlad — Tue, 23 Jul 2019 10:52:03 +0000

Thanks for the article, but it’s not clear where to put the following code:

private async void MainWindow_OnLoaded(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
using (var updateManager = new UpdateManager(@”C:\SquirrelReleases”))
{
CurrentVersion.Text = $”Current version: {updateManager.CurrentlyInstalledVersion()}”;
var releaseEntry = await updateManager.UpdateApp();
NewVersion.Text = $”Update Version: {releaseEntry?.Version.ToString() ?? “No update”}”;
}
}

By: Kevin

Kevin — Mon, 17 Sep 2018 16:45:49 +0000

In reply to Mike.

Hi Mike,

Thanks for the comment. Can you open an issue on the Squirrel repository? https://github.com/Squirrel/Squirrel.Windows/issues
My experience has been that the author and community around this project have been very responsive when it comes to possible architecture issues.

By: Mike

Mike — Mon, 17 Sep 2018 06:37:39 +0000

Squirrel is intensely infuriating. Maybe I can’t emphasise “intensely” enough. It HAS TO be able to be overridden for the instances of not having admin level. Maybe if it could generate a notification rather than put a “A new helper for xxxx app is available. Please enter admin credentials…”

By: javier

javier — Fri, 14 Sep 2018 17:06:30 +0000

thanks!