[Mono-dev] Application Deployment

[Carlos J. Muentes]

I'm going with a .bat file for now to launch the app, but I get an ugly
DOS window in the background.  Even if I double-click the .exe file and
let the .NET Framework load the assembly I get an ungly DOS window. 
This isn't to kosher IMHO, as most Windows applications do not exhibit
this behavior.  Perhaps a .NETFX launcher is the only way to go . . .


> -------- Original Message --------
> Subject: [Mono-dev] Application Deployment
> From: "Carlos J. Muentes" <carlos at rockwithme.org>
> Date: Fri, August 11, 2006 8:18 am
> To: mono-devel-list at lists.ximian.com
> 
> Hey All,
> 
>   I recently finished building an application using mono and gtk#, and
> now I'm trying to decide what the best way to deploy it is.  It's an
> open source project hosted on sourceforge (it's actually a port from
> .NET 2.0, 100% gtk# =^), so it'll be available publicly.
> 
>   My question is this: how can I build an RPM package that will i.e.
> automatically create menu entries, as well as the proper file layout
> (as recommended in Guidelines:Application Deployment)?  
> 
>   Also, it's imperative that this application be easily installable in
> Windows as well.  How can I create a launcher for this application that
> can contain an application icon (since batch files cannot)?  My idea is
> to create a custom .NET application that will install and launch this
> one, but are there any better ideas?  This could be a good project to
> contribute to the mono development community: an app that mimics
> install4j, but for C#/mono.
> 
>   Deploying mono applications seems to be a subject that isn't too
> popular, but IMHO needs to be addressed quickly since applications
> built using mono are popping up left and right.  
> 
>   Of course xcopy deployment is a beautiful thing, but I don't think
> it's realistic since .exe files cannot be launched directly in *nix,
> and the .NET Framework will load and execute those same .exe files in
> Windows, along with all bugs switching between mono and .NET (this
> application is simply too buggy to release to the .NET Framework, with
> things like anonymous methods simply not working, but works flawlessly
> in mono).  Yea, I know, start-up scripts.  I suppose that brings up
> another question: how to add these start-up scripts to the Applications
> menu (gnome/kde) with an associated icon?  I think start-up scripts are
> out of the question in Windows, since you cannot decorate them with
> custom icons; an .exe file is required.
> 
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