distributing/overview

[giscus[bot]]

distributing/overview

Distributing with Velopack is extremely easy, it's usually just as simple as uploading your files somewhere that can be downloaded with HTTP. This means you could host them on an IIS or nodejs site, on shared file hosting such as AWS S3, Azure Storage, BackBlaze B2, or even for free on GitHub/GitLab releases if your project is open source.

https://docs.velopack.io/distributing/overview

[bearyung]

How's the UpdateManager.DownloadUpdatesAsync() determine download the full version or delta version? I've tried on Mac OS to build 1.0.0, upload that to online storage, setup the app and build a new 1.0.1 and upload that to the online storage.

I've found that the UpdateManager.DownloadUpdatesAsync() will download {app_name}-1.0.1-osx-full.nupkg instead of {app_name}-1.0.1-osx-delta.nupkg

[caesay]

Hello! Because of how the .pkg installer works, it cannot contain the files necessary for delta updates - so the first update on macos will do a full update instead. The second update and all others after that should use deltas.

[bearyung]

Thanks for the quick response! Have tried and confirm that the deltas works for 1.0.2 and so on!

[nabeelbaghoor]

Hey, I am on windows and am just distributing YourAppId-Portable.zip extracted as we don't need to install the app. The app is running and fetching the updates! Thanks. Now, in remote update folder, exactly which files i should upload in order to make updates work. Just these?

• releases.win
• full
• delta

or i need everything inside Releases

[caesay]

Only the files you've listed are required for updates.

[Mopy18]

Hey, I'm migrating from Clowd.Squirrel to Velopack and if I understand correctly of my next update I must upload both RELEASES and releases.{channel}.json files.

What about the other updates that will come after?

• Should I continue publishing both files until all my users have updated to Velopack? (but I have now way of knowing that)
• Is the releases.{channel}.json file enough? Like if a user has not opened the app for a long time and is still on the Clowd.Squirrel version, there will be 2 updates in a row? (one to update to the latest version available in RELEASES, and a second one that will use the releases.{channel}.json because now the app can use Velopack).

[caesay]

Your assumptions are correct. You don't need to keep updating the RELEASES file, but if you stop it means anyone migrating from Squirrel will get two updates (one from Squirrel to Velopack, and then another to the latest Velopack release). You will need to make that determination. It may be sensible to keep updating RELEASES for a short while, so your active users get a better update experience. Any users who have not been updated by that point will just get an extra update, not a big deal.

[Mopy18]

Great! Thank you for the fast answer, and thank you for developing Velopack you did an amazing job!