Help! Client pi**ed off that we're using .NET Framework!

  • Thread starter Thread starter John Dean
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J

John Dean

We just completed a project that includes a Windows Forms application.
Unfortunately the client wasn't aware of the .NET Framework requirement on
client computers, and now says that the 22 MB download (for computers w/o
the framework) is unreasonable. It is obviously not possible for us to
rewrite the entire application using VB6 or C++ at this point, but the
client insists that requiring the download is not a feasible option for his
users. Is there any way we can convince him otherwise? Any good arguments or
talking points? Or better yet, is there a way to reduce the size of the
redistributable .NET framework download or include only parts of it ?
Thanks!
 
John Dean said:
We just completed a project that includes a Windows Forms application.
Unfortunately the client wasn't aware of the .NET Framework requirement on
client computers, and now says that the 22 MB download (for computers w/o
the framework) is unreasonable.
Click to expand...

22MB is indeed quite a huge download if users don't have a fast Internet
connection. However, your client needs to know that:

- the .NET Framework is going to be required by more and more applications.
Sooner or later, they will need to download and install it anyway.
- if the application is intended to be deployed on a company network, the
network administrator can deploy the .NET Framewrok all all the machines. I
believe that there are tools to do that. That's his/her job after all.
- 22MB is a small price to pay when you consider the time and money saved by
developping with .NET instead of C++ (this is discusable i know)

If your client is refuses the discussion, you can use the linker Sunny
proposed, but you need to know that if you use it:
- Each of your application will have a piece of the .NET Framework but the
..NET Framework itself won't be installed on the user's machines. This means
that if you have several .NET applications that use this linker on a
machine, the sum of all bit of the .NET Framework linked to each application
may be greater than 22MB while the user would still not have the real .NET
framework insatlled on his/her machine.
- If a security risk or a bug is discovered in the .NET Framework, Microsoft
will place a fix on Windows Update. But as your applications do not use the
real .NET framework, this fix won't fix your applications: you will have to
generate a new executable with the new fixed framework for *all* of your
applications and ask each and every user to download *all* your applications
again. A great loss of time. If they had the .NET Framework installed, they
would just need to download the official fix and all applications would use
the fixed framework.
 
Give him as many CDs as he needs with the .NET redistributable on an autorun
bootstrap and move on.
 
What are the legal implications of taking parts of MS's runtime and
distributing them in your own fashion? You should get that part figured out
first, even if it looks technically sound.

-mike
MVP
 
If the users are physically close by, this is the best option by far...
but then again, if the users were physically close by (e.g. on the same
network), then a 22MB download would take only a few minutes, and this
wouldn't be a showstopper.

Methinks that this option, while appealing, will not suffice.

Respectfully,
--- N
 
How big is your application then? It must be fairly small that 22Mb is
considered a big hit. As an example, our product fills 300Mb of a CD, of
which 200Mb is .NET, IE, MSDE etc. (ie 22Mb is a small proportion of the
rest of the program and updates).

Our installer takes the user through *any* updates required -- there's no
leaflet saying 'you must download this first' -- you can install the thing
on a clean install of Win98 if necessary, and after a couple of reboots
you're up and running.

Requirements just confuse the average user -- but setup.exe is usually
acceptable.

What I'm trying to say is that your problem could simply be one of
presentation.

Stu
 
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