Find out **.
–
** Requires Windows, and while it doesn’t require Firefox, the only people who will truly understand how wonderful this is are those in whom have attempted to deploy ClickOnce apps, only to discover that getting them to work via clicking a link inside of Firefox is both a headache and heartache waiting to happen — *AT BEST*!
What about Google Code and SVN? That, my friends, is gunna cost ya a click (just “One”, though. ;-)
Update: Before I leave the wrong impression as to who came up with this hack, please see Saurabh Pant’s (MSFT ClickOnce team?) “ClickOnce and Firefox” entry from about this time last year, though last night was the first time I came across it.
Update: For those who clicked, installed, and are now wondering how 25megs worth of a download resulted in what looks to be nothing more than an IronPython console, take a look @ http://www.oreillynet.com/xml/blog/2007/03/finally.html for a better understanding of what it is you have sitting in front of you. Then add Saxon on .NET, IKVM.NET (and therefore support for a good portion of the Java class library), BitTorrent, UPNP, ASP.NET, annnnddddd… hmmm… I’m missing something. Well, anyway, look inside here for more.
Update: For those of you left wondering what I am referring to when I state “support for a good portion of the Java class library” try the following from the IP console you’re left staring at after installing the above app,
>>> import clr
>>> clr.AddReference('IKVM.Gnu.Classpath.dll')
>>> import java
>>> dir(java)
Update: Sorry for all the updates, but I have one more,
Update: The notion of having to install a ClickOnce app to then go and harvest the generated .appref-ms link file from the Start Menu folder was driving me *insane*! Now it’s not…
NOTE: The ‘Now it’s not…’ link will generate from a ClickOnce .application file a <SpaceRemovedProductName>.appref-ms file, the contents of which will look similar to,
http://extf.googlecode.com/svn/release/xameleon/personalwebplatform/Xameleon.WebApp.application#Xameleon.WebApp.application, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=99db3f8680e38416, processorArchitecture=msil
Try FFClickOnce, a Firefox extension for running ClickOnce apps: http://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/1608/
David,
WTF??? Can you PLEASE explain what is going on? I think this may be VERY exciting, but I need a dummies version or at least step by step.
@Anonymous,
While I agree that the FFClickOnce add-in is nice,
1) It has to be installed first.
2) And even after it's installed, the pre-generated ClickOnce page still is of the assumption that the .NET 2.0 framework isn't installed, and provides an "Install" button that is much more prevalent and obvious than the "launch" link contained in the text. The natural inclination is to click the "Install" button, and when you do, the installation fails. It's only when you click the "launch" link that you are presented the option to either save the file, or launch the application, and if you attempt to save the file and then launch it directly, it once again fails.
That's too many points of potential failure, and one too many pre-installed requirements (requiring an additional plugin installation) to make the FFClickOnce plugin a legitimate solution for mass deployment of a ClickOnce application. The above solution requires that you add a post compile process to your build process, and it requires that you generate a Firefox specific installation page, but the upside is that in doing so you are guaranteed that your application will deploy after one click across both IE and Fx, where as with the plugin you are not.
None-the-less, I appreciate the info. It's just not a solution that I believe is something that works from the standpoint of the masses.
@Json,
Am working on a new write-up that goes into greater detail. Hope to have that posted later today.