Jason Lautzenheiser

ClickOnce Not Working, Serving up Raw XML

OK, this has been a strange journey.  A week or so ago I ran into a problem with a smart client (1.1) I had created for a client.  To recap, the problem was since I installed the 2.0 Framework (VS2005), when clicking on the link to launch the smart client, IE would bring up the File Download dialog.  In other words,  IEExec was not seeing that the exe was a smart client and thus not launching.

Well did some more testing and it is indeed 2.0 causing the problem.  If I uninstall VS2005 and the 2.0 Framework, the 1.1 smart clients start working again, reinstall just the 2.0 framework, they no longer work.

As a further test, I tried to convert the smart client to 2.0 and use the ClickOnce technology (which is very slick by the way).  This would be a better solution anyways and wouldn't take that much to convert the program to 2.0.  Well converted it, published it to the web server and tried to launch by pointing a link to the .application file and the browser simply brings up the raw XML from that file.  IE does not even try to launch the app.

I ran the 2.0 app from the command line using

rundll32.exe dfshim.dll,ShOpenVerbApplication http://www.malachicomputer.com/test/test.application

and everything ran fine....it is just as if the link between IE and the smart client technologies is broken when 2.0 is installed.

All very strange and it seems that some people are having simliar problems so I'm not alone, although I have yet to see anyone that has found a solution.  So any insight anyone possesses would be greatly appreciated.

Smart Client, IE Brings up File Download Dialog

I developed a smart client for a customer a while back.  It's linked off of their website and has worked fine for quite some time.  I haven't worked with it for awhile, but this morning I had someone ask me a question about it so I went to fire it off to take a look and now IE is bringing up the standard download dialog.  It is happening on both of my development machines.  Program still runs fine in development. I will test on a few other machines, although it appears that it may be working fine for other people.

My initial thoughts is perhaps since I installed VS2005 on these machines that since the smart client was developed under 1.1 that perhaps the 2.0 framework is causing my some grief.

Any thoughts?

VistaDB 2.1 Released - Small Footprint Database

Yes I've yet to use this or even try a trial of this.  But the idea of a robust database with very simple deployment would come in handy for many of those small apps I create for clients.  I will try this out and see how well it works in real world usage.

And yes, this is my post to try and get a free license.  So, hopefully this will satisfy the requirements put forth by the VistaDB company.

VistaDB 2.1 database for .NET has been released This 2.1 update includes over 60 improvements, including new support for .NET 2.0 and Visual Studio .NET 2005. VistaDB is a small-footprint, embedded SQL database alternative to Jet/Access, MSDE and SQL Server Express 2005 that enables developers to build .NET 1.1 and .NET 2.0 applications. Features SQL-92 support, small 500KB embedded footprint, free 2-User VistaDB Server for remote TCP/IP data access, royalty free distribution for both embedded and server, Copy 'n Go! deployment, managed ADO.NET Provider, data management and data migration tools. Free trial is available for download. - Learn more about VistaDB - Repost this to your blog and receive a FREE copy of VistaDB 2.1!