Re:Microsoft Open Sources C# Compiler
by Aaronontheweb on Thursday April 03, 2014 @01:35PM
(#7524511)
WPF just got some love a few minutes ago - they've got plans for a new release of it by the sound of things.
[ Parent
| on HN ]
I have a few WPF 4 bugs that were marked "fix in next version" 3-4 years ago, and then it was announced that there is no next version - i'm in the process of moving off WPF and this newfound love is not going to change anything.
Yes. Good luck to Microsoft trying to be relevant in HTML5 space.
Similar problem with IE for me. I raised a case with gold partner support when IE9 came out as it broke ClickOnce download prompting. Been bouncing back and forth between framework and IE teams ever since.
Result: we now have to ship a .reg file to our clients before we can launch our shit via ClickOnce. That's only 2000 people we now have to hand hold through this.....
Yeah, ClickOnce should go down as one of the bigger dead-end embarrassments, since they torpedo'd installer projects in VS2012.
Why did they get rid of Installer Projects? We are still on VS2010 and although it isn't a massive issue to use a different installer system, it seems a very odd decision. I mean, you are writing apps for their OS using their tools. Why wouldn't you want to create an installer? Daft!
It's because the installer packages stink. WiX is a far better platform.
We know they stink, but it's what a lot of people have spent time working with.
There is no straightforward migration path from vdproj to WiX, either. It's a case of re-writing all of your deployment code (which has already been tested/tweaked/hacked on for years) for no upfront benefit.
It's pretty simple. We used this and it took about an hour on top to adjust our build system to label the packages properly:
http://www.add-in-express.com/vdproj-wix-converter/index.php
WiX is missing all the ease-of-use features it needs to be a non-agonizing process. Deprecating installer packages in favour of WiX would make sense if they provided a migration path and better tooling for WiX.
I've been out of the Windows deployment ecosystem for ages. What's the benefit of using WiX over nsis?
You get Windows Installer packages, so you can deploy applications via group policies, you get other niceties, like pretending an application is installed until it's actually used (and install then), you get proper transaction support during the installation (something I've seen very many NSIS installers get wrong – maybe that has changed, but not cleaning up after yourself if a step during the installation failed is not how to write an installer).
WPF is alive and kicking. I'll just leave this here... https://careers.microsoft.com/jobdetails.aspx?jid=137020&pp=...