Managing without .NET for runtime applications

23 Nov 2006 1:05 PM

Jerry Spence1

My company produces IP Surviellance softwrae (CCTV, Access control etc) and
one of the features of our software is the ability to produce a CD with all
the images, together with a run time version of the viewer. The intention is
that anyone (the police) can insert the CD into any PC and see the video
sequence.

This all worked OK (ish) in VB6, but we always suffered from data access
components, DLL hell etc. We have now upgraded to VB2005 using .NET 2.0.

The problem is that our CD Viewer requires .NET to be installed on the
target machine and we can't rely on the end user having Internet access, or
Administrator rights, or the ability to pre-install .NET. I was wondering if
there was a way of producing a package with just the elements of .NET that
was being used, so that these could be written to the CD. Any other
thoughts?

-Jerry

23 Nov 2006 1:33 PM

jeff

I have a similar issue ... but the problem is ... once you choose to use
..Net, you are at the mercy of the host PC ... and it MUST have the latest
..Net framework (or relavent .Net framework) installed. Or the user must
have access to and security rights for installing the necessary .Net
Framework.

I have yet to find a work around! >Net works for a controlled environment,
but stinks when you have not control over a target PC ...

Show quoteHide quote

"Jerry Spence1" <jerry.spe***@somewhere.com> wrote in message
news:45659c8c$0$8743$ed2619ec@ptn-nntp-reader02.plus.net...
> My company produces IP Surviellance softwrae (CCTV, Access control etc)
> and one of the features of our software is the ability to produce a CD
> with all the images, together with a run time version of the viewer. The
> intention is that anyone (the police) can insert the CD into any PC and
> see the video sequence.
>
> This all worked OK (ish) in VB6, but we always suffered from data access
> components, DLL hell etc. We have now upgraded to VB2005 using .NET 2.0.
>
> The problem is that our CD Viewer requires .NET to be installed on the
> target machine and we can't rely on the end user having Internet access,
> or Administrator rights, or the ability to pre-install .NET. I was
> wondering if there was a way of producing a package with just the elements
> of .NET that was being used, so that these could be written to the CD. Any
> other thoughts?
>
> -Jerry
>

23 Nov 2006 1:57 PM

Robinson

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"Jerry Spence1" <jerry.spe***@somewhere.com> wrote in message
news:45659c8c$0$8743$ed2619ec@ptn-nntp-reader02.plus.net...
> My company produces IP Surviellance softwrae (CCTV, Access control etc)
> and one of the features of our software is the ability to produce a CD
> with all the images, together with a run time version of the viewer. The
> intention is that anyone (the police) can insert the CD into any PC and
> see the video sequence.
>
> This all worked OK (ish) in VB6, but we always suffered from data access
> components, DLL hell etc. We have now upgraded to VB2005 using .NET 2.0.
>
> The problem is that our CD Viewer requires .NET to be installed on the
> target machine and we can't rely on the end user having Internet access,
> or Administrator rights, or the ability to pre-install .NET. I was
> wondering if there was a way of producing a package with just the elements
> of .NET that was being used, so that these could be written to the CD. Any
> other thoughts?

You can run a little stub program to detect if .NET is installed, if it is
you run as normal, if it isn't you prompt the user to install it (ship the
runtime installer on your CD). If the user is motivated enough to run your
program, he will call his system administrator or make other suitable
arrangements - it takes 5 minutes to install and it's a 1-time thing. Note
that the .NET framework has been available for ages on Windows Update and a
lot of corporates have it installed in one form or another by default.

You might also consider another technology for this, such as a Flash
presentation (if it's just an image viewer) or simple web page.

23 Nov 2006 3:14 PM

Jerry Spence1

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"Robinson" <toomuchspamhaspassed@myinboxtoomuchtoooften.com> wrote in
message news:ek49bc$ckf$1$8302bc10@news.demon.co.uk...
>
> "Jerry Spence1" <jerry.spe***@somewhere.com> wrote in message
> news:45659c8c$0$8743$ed2619ec@ptn-nntp-reader02.plus.net...
>> My company produces IP Surviellance softwrae (CCTV, Access control etc)
>> and one of the features of our software is the ability to produce a CD
>> with all the images, together with a run time version of the viewer. The
>> intention is that anyone (the police) can insert the CD into any PC and
>> see the video sequence.
>>
>> This all worked OK (ish) in VB6, but we always suffered from data access
>> components, DLL hell etc. We have now upgraded to VB2005 using .NET 2.0.
>>
>> The problem is that our CD Viewer requires .NET to be installed on the
>> target machine and we can't rely on the end user having Internet access,
>> or Administrator rights, or the ability to pre-install .NET. I was
>> wondering if there was a way of producing a package with just the
>> elements of .NET that was being used, so that these could be written to
>> the CD. Any other thoughts?
>
> You can run a little stub program to detect if .NET is installed, if it is
> you run as normal, if it isn't you prompt the user to install it (ship the
> runtime installer on your CD). If the user is motivated enough to run
> your program, he will call his system administrator or make other suitable
> arrangements - it takes 5 minutes to install and it's a 1-time thing.
> Note that the .NET framework has been available for ages on Windows Update
> and a lot of corporates have it installed in one form or another by
> default.
>
> You might also consider another technology for this, such as a Flash
> presentation (if it's just an image viewer) or simple web page.

Bearing in mind the CD could be used on a courtroom PC with no prior notice,
I can not require .NET to be installed. I am starting to find products that
extract the various bits you need from the framework. Typing deploying .net
without framework into google seems to have produced some results.

-Jerry

23 Nov 2006 3:36 PM

Robinson

>
> Bearing in mind the CD could be used on a courtroom PC with no prior
> notice, I can not require .NET to be installed. I am starting to find
> products that extract the various bits you need from the framework. Typing
> deploying .net without framework into google seems to have produced some
> results.
>
> -Jerry

Sounds rather dodgy to me and not supportable through future versions (I
would assume) if you take it apart DLL by DLL and dump them onto your CD,
not forgetting potentially having to register components....... There is a
difference between a framework and a library and .NET is not really a
library in that sense. I would be inclined to use another technology.
Something instantly available, of which there are many possibilities,
including sticking with VB 6, using VC++, Flash, HTML etc. But if you want
to hack .NET apart as the best solution, I would say someone made a bad
decision to build the software with .NET in the first place.

23 Nov 2006 5:20 PM

Rad [Visual C# MVP]

Hey Jerry,

Take a look at Thinstall
http://www.thinstall.com/solutions/net_virtual.php

This might be exactly what you company needs

On Thu, 23 Nov 2006 13:05:12 -0000, "Jerry Spence1"
<jerry.spe***@somewhere.com> wrote:

Show quoteHide quote

>My company produces IP Surviellance softwrae (CCTV, Access control etc) and
>one of the features of our software is the ability to produce a CD with all
>the images, together with a run time version of the viewer. The intention is
>that anyone (the police) can insert the CD into any PC and see the video
>sequence.
>
>This all worked OK (ish) in VB6, but we always suffered from data access
>components, DLL hell etc. We have now upgraded to VB2005 using .NET 2.0.
>
>The problem is that our CD Viewer requires .NET to be installed on the
>target machine and we can't rely on the end user having Internet access, or
>Administrator rights, or the ability to pre-install .NET. I was wondering if
>there was a way of producing a package with just the elements of .NET that
>was being used, so that these could be written to the CD. Any other
>thoughts?
>
>-Jerry
>
--

Bits.Bytes.
http://bytes.thinkersroom.com

10 Jan 2007 3:09 PM

Jerry Spence1

Yes it is exactily what is needed. However at $4,995 + $39 that can wait!

It did get me searching though and I found www.xenocode.com . I have
evaluated Xenocode Postbuild 2007 Professional and it works a treat. And it
is only $399.

Well happy.

-Jerry

Show quoteHide quote

"Rad [Visual C# MVP]" <nospam@nospam.com> wrote in message
news:v0mbm21ndmnse4r2755kc2go54d7ceg6i8@4ax.com...
> Hey Jerry,
>
> Take a look at Thinstall
> http://www.thinstall.com/solutions/net_virtual.php
>
> This might be exactly what you company needs
>
> On Thu, 23 Nov 2006 13:05:12 -0000, "Jerry Spence1"
> <jerry.spe***@somewhere.com> wrote:
>
>>My company produces IP Surviellance softwrae (CCTV, Access control etc)
>>and
>>one of the features of our software is the ability to produce a CD with
>>all
>>the images, together with a run time version of the viewer. The intention
>>is
>>that anyone (the police) can insert the CD into any PC and see the video
>>sequence.
>>
>>This all worked OK (ish) in VB6, but we always suffered from data access
>>components, DLL hell etc. We have now upgraded to VB2005 using .NET 2.0.
>>
>>The problem is that our CD Viewer requires .NET to be installed on the
>>target machine and we can't rely on the end user having Internet access,
>>or
>>Administrator rights, or the ability to pre-install .NET. I was wondering
>>if
>>there was a way of producing a package with just the elements of .NET that
>>was being used, so that these could be written to the CD. Any other
>>thoughts?
>>
>>-Jerry
>>
> --
>
> Bits.Bytes.
> http://bytes.thinkersroom.com