Using the small dcuhelper.exe utility

 Top  Previous  Next

So if you want to add update checking support to your program, you can do so by creating a .dcupdate file in your program directory, and distributing this dcuhelper.exe program with your program.  When you or the user wishes to check for updates, you simply execute this utility (e.g. ShellExecute) and it will:

1.Locate the DcUpdater installed on the user's computer and invoke it for your program (and any plugins your program might have).
2.Or if the DcUpdater tool is not installed, it will tell them so and bring them to the web page where they can download and install it.

 

Size: 100k (could be compressed if you like to make it even smaller).

Download: http://www.donationcoder.com/Software/Mouser/Updater/downloads/dcuhelper.zip

 

The dcuhelper.exe tool can also be used to "register" your program with DcUpdater so that it will appear in the default list of installed programs known by DcUpdater which can be checked for updates.

 

 

1. To register your programs directory with the system updater:

 dcuhelper.exe -r "program_labelname" "full_path_to_app_directory"

 

2. To invoke the updaterwith various commandline options:

 dcuhelper.exe -[r]i "program_labelname" "full_path_to_app_directory" "missingupdatertitle_or_._for_silent" [commandline options to be passed to updater]

  e.g.

   dcuhelper.exe -ri "ProcessTamer" "C:\Program Files\ProcessTamer" "Error"

 

I need to say a bit more about using DcUpdater to add update checking support to your programs/downloads:

 

•There are a lot of other update checking tools (commercial + free).
•Most of them either compile into your program, or are a dll you load into your code and invoke.
•Some are standalone executables that your program can launch.

 

The DcUpdater tool is most similar to #3, in that it is a standalone update checking executable, which does not have to be compiled into your code.

 

However where it differs from other such tools is that the full update checker tool is not really meant to be included with each individual program that uses it.

 

Instead, the intention is for the DcUpdater tool to be installed like any other application on a users computer, and provide a centralized update checking system for many programs.

 

That is, the user installs DcUpdater to their system, and other programs can "invoke it" to check for updates.  You can see this at work in my software -- so far 8 of my programs know how to invoke the DcUpdater tool to check for updates.

 

 

The tiny 100k dcuhelper.exe tool is not the updater itself(!)  It's a helper utility meant to be packaged in your program, whose only job is to find and communicate with the main big DcUpdater tool installed on the user's computer, OR help the user to download and install it if it's not already (if they want to).

 

 

What this means to you as a developer, is that your users will have to go through an extra step if this is the yours is the first program they have installed that uses the DcUpdater tool and they haven't installed it yet.  They may find this confusing and irritating.

 

So probably you want to go find yourself an update checking solution that is self-contained and you probably don't want to use DcUpdater.

 

However, if you do want to use it, i'm here to help.  It may be a good match for you if one or more of the following is true:

 

   * You are a programmer who hangs out at DonationCoder.

   * You have a bunch of tools, each of which needs update support.

   * You use plugins or other user-written content and want an easy way to check for updates for lots of independent items.

   * You like the idea of not bloating up each program with its own update checking code.