Delivery mechanisms

There are a number of mechanisms to deliver the setup executable and supporting files. Understand the infrastructure so you are not surprised by not being able to load the application because they do not have a machine with a CD player or Internet connectivity. Your delivery method is also going to depend on other factors. Are you distributing to an individual, pushing to a few customers, or a vertical market with dozens or maybe even hundreds or thousands of implementations ?

Diskettes

We know diskettes seem like yesterday ‚ s technology, but many still work with a notebook computer that does not have a built-in CD burner . We use our diskette drive to copy files to a customer in a pinch while we are at a client ‚ s office. Granted, this is not common, but it is still a mechanism for installation. All the modern installation tools build the needed files sizes to be copied to the diskette media. It is uncommon today, but there are still companies using computers without CD drives in them and the only way to load them physically is a diskette drive or a network connection (if they are connected to a network).

There are two big problems with diskette delivery. The first is packaging. CDs are cheaper to send via snail mail because you send fewer items. Have you ever had to ship six diskettes to 100 customers? The cost can be expensive with postage , duplication, and assembly. The second problem is your company image. Most of us are hired because we are at the leading edge of technology. Obviously diskettes are considered older and CDs are considered closer to current technology. We work with a number of customers who find the latest bleeding edge technology to be a must because it helps with their image to their customer base. They expect the same from their vendors . Personally, this author really hates the idea of installing a package that comes on several diskettes. It simply takes more time because diskette drives are slower and require more operator intervention.

One other problem with diskettes is the reliability issue. This technology has been around for decades, but it never seems to fail that Murphy ‚ s Law applies when an important mission critical release is in the works. The diskette is bad, the copy process missed an essential bit, or the mail delivery process performs a magnetic re-alignment of the diskette surface. Over the years we have known many lucky developers, and others that have had nothing but trouble. Your mileage might vary.

Zip/Jaz/SuperDisk disks

The super disks are common and were a big step up from the 1.44MB floppies we were accustomed to using before CD-ROM burners became reasonably priced for developers. These drives are inexpensive, portable, and can be connected to our client ‚ s machines if they do not have one of their own.

One of the big advantages in using this type of media is we could fit an installation for a moderately sized application on one disk. It is cheaper to mail one small super disk than the comparable seventy diskettes. Today Iomega zip drives come in 100MB, 250MB, and 750MB (more space than a CD-ROM).

We used this delivery mechanism frequently for local clients before we had our CD-ROM burner. It is still a handy way to handle clients that do not have CD-ROMs (few, but they exist).

The problem you may encounter with this technology is you need to use the lowest common denominator and while you might have an Iomega Zip drive, your clients might be using a Jaz drive, have a SuperDisk, or a Syquest drive. This is why we purchased a nice case for our Zip drive and brought our own. Also be sure to check the way it is connected to the machine (parallel or USB port) and to make sure the client has the correct ports to connect the drive.

Memory sticks

Have you seen these new fangled memory sticks (also called a memory drive) that plug into a USB port? The first thing we thought of when we saw one of these is, ‚“cool, what a nice mechanism to transfer a set of small files from one machine to another ‚½. These memory sticks started out small, but are readily available in sizes up to 256MB (at least in early 2003). We are sure they will get even more memory. A similar concept is the PCMCIA adapters or USB adapters for CompactFlash, Secure Digital, or SmartMedia cards that have even more memory.

This is not a mechanism for mass distribution of the initial installation for a large project, but it can be useful if you are on-site with a client and need to add a quick feature or fix a problem, recompile the app, and copy over the new executable for testing. These memory sticks show up as a new drive on the computer they are connected to. No need to reboot, just plug it in, wait for the operating system to recognize it, and copy the files.

CD-ROM and DVDs

CD-ROMs are probably the second most popular delivery mechanism next to downloading from the Internet. The CD format provides a minimum 650MB of disk space for files and the format is supported by all the modern installation tools and even something as dated as the VFP Setup Wizard that shipped with Visual FoxPro 3, 5, and 6. CD-ROM burners are very cheap these days and the software works reliably. We have been burning CDs for the last few years and customers find the advantages to be significant.

CDs provide for a much faster installation process because they have a faster transfer rate and there is no diskette swapping. Vertical market creators find there are fewer disks, which leads to cheaper packaging. The cost savings are more significant the more customers you have in the user base. CDs are also more durable than a diskette and take less storage space in the customer ‚ s office.

We always deliver customers a CD for initial installation, especially for runtimes, ActiveX, and other support files. One CD has a client computer installation and another has a one-time server installation. These can be on the same CD as well depending on how you architect the installation setups. This way support staff (either on-site MIS, technical support personnel, or a representative from our company) can go from PC to PC and install the runtimes on the workstations. This install can be run from the CD or run from the server.

Add polish to the package by creating a label for the CD. This can be as simple as running the Label Wizard in Microsoft Word ( Figure 6 and 7 ) or getting a label creation software package at the local office supply store. We cannot tell you how big a difference the reception is when we started doing this. This is a simple process and can take less than a few minutes to do depending on the complexity of the label created. We simply note the application name , version number, release date, and include our company logo as well as the customer ‚ s company logo if it applies.

Figure 6. The Microsoft Word Envelopes and Labels wizard is a quick and simple way to create a CD-ROM label for your install CDs. On this dialog select the Avery Standard 5824 CD Label and click the New Document button to open up a document ready for you to create your label.

Figure 7. The Microsoft Word Envelopes and Labels wizard creates a Word table so you can create two labels per sheet which is standard from label providers.

The disadvantage to the CD-ROM delivery mechanism is it has to be either hand delivered, shipped via the postal service, or possibly one of the overnight vendors. How fast it gets in your customer ‚ s hands depends on geographic distance, whether you ship priority overnight, or through standard mail channels. Although CDs on computers are very common these days, occasionally you may run into a client site where they have older machines without a CD or a policy of not buying CD readers because they do not want employees to play music while they are working (yes, this is not just a Dilbert story).

DVD burners are just starting to become available to the average developer. The initial DVDs hold 4.37GB of data, which is more than six times as much as a CD-R. Advances in the laser technology have some manufacturers looking at 27GB and others looking at more. This technology is growing and improving at a rapid pace. Our fear is that what we write today will be obsolete before the book is even printed. If your data does not fit on a CD and your clients have DVD readers at their offices, this might be a solution to investigate.

One danger with DVDs you need to be aware of is, like so many other things in our industry, there are several standards. Unfortunately, like the battle of Betamax vs. VHS many years ago, we are not sure what standard will win out. So do you get a DVD burner that supports DVD+R/RW, DVD-R/RW, or DVD RAM? Which standard does your customer ‚ s computer support? This technology might be a bit immature to consider, but maybe not before long.

E-mail

Packaging the install files and attaching them to an e-mail is a quick method to get a release to a client. Until recently, this was our most common mechanism for delivery. We are sure this is obvious to most developers, but using compression is important when utilizing this mechanism for delivery. It seems in this time of broadband access to the Internet, many people think nothing of sending attachments with megabytes of data. This is great when you are in the office or at home with a DSL or cable connection, but it is terrible when you are on vacation in Hawaii hooked up with a dial-up connection that creeps along as if you were watching a replay running in slow motion.

Sending an executable or an update to the databases works great over e-mail. The clients detach the files we send, unzip them to the appropriate test folder, run the application, and verify the results of the test plan (do we live in a perfect world or what). Once the tests are verified the same files can be detached to the production directory for all the users to use.

One of the problems we ran into with customers using e-mail is they do not know how to detach the attachments even if we send explicit instructions on how to accomplish this task. This is common with computer-phobic people. A common resolution to this is calling the customer on the phone and stepping them through the instructions. Another issue we ran into over the years is some e-mail systems in the corporate world limit the size of attachments on outgoing e- mails . This may set up a roadblock for corporate developers shipping releases to their customers. The same limitation has been seen with Internet Service Providers (ISP). Some firewalls also stop attachments with EXEs and DLLs. Some are even so intelligent they stop a ZIP file that contains an EXE or DLL.

FTP

We have worked with clients that have their own File Transfer Protocol (FTP) site. We copy the installation setup files to the server and the customer copies them down when it is convenient for them. We recommend the files are compressed to save time on the transfer. We also recommend getting a FTP client that can restart interrupted file transfers if you have unstable Internet connections and/or large files to send.

This process is faster and less expensive than burning a CD and mailing it. It does not face the same limitations as sending the files via e-mail. The files can be transferred at any time of the day so it can be done after hours when the customers are out of the office.

You do need to notify the users the files have been copied to their FTP site and are ready to be implemented. The need to communicate with the client is no different from any other mechanism. They need to be aware of the release. In this scenario they need to download the file, or depending on the configuration of the web server, copy it over the network.

Web site downloads

The Internet is obviously a terrific delivery mechanism in our industry. We rarely buy software in a brick and mortar store these days. What we are often doing is downloading it from a Web site ( Figure 8 ). If we can do this, why can ‚ t our clients? While we can say we usually push the releases to our customers, we can place the update on our super secret Web site and have our customers decide when they want to pull the release. They can also do it at their convenience.

Figure 8. Downloading files from the Internet via the Internet browser has become commonplace.

One of the nice advantages of allowing them to download the file is they decide when they want to take the hit on their bandwidth. If you send it in e-mail, they take the download hit just after you send it and they open their e-mail client. This can be a problem if it takes 30 minutes when they are waiting for an e-mail order from one of their customers. Web download is an ideal transfer mechanism for vertical market apps as well because it reduces the distribution costs of duplication and packaging. Web server security also gives you a chance to have clients log in and provide the transfers over a secured socket layer.

There are drawbacks to this mechanism as well. If you do not have a logging feature on the Web site, you do not know if the customer came to get the installation. If several clients are running the software and they do not download the new version you could have them running different versions, which means you need to support the various versions available. This is not unique to this mechanism of distribution, but it is a concern. If you do not have security implemented or your Internet service provider does not give you this capability, users or any other surfers could potentially get the installation files. We recommend some sort of password access to the files. This access could be to the download directory on the web server, or could be applied to a zip file they are downloading.

Symantec ‚ s pcAnywhere

If you have only one tool you can buy to support your customers, make it pcAnywhere from Symantec. For those not familiar with pcAnywhere, it is a communications application that lets you connect to another computer and run it remotely. There is a file transfer feature to allow you to deliver files needed in the implementation and subsequent support of your custom application. This tool is a must have for our company, to the point we buy it for a customer as part of the deal for the custom application. It saves on on-site travel and provides immediate support to their problems.

The file transfer functionality of pcAnywhere ( Figure 9 ) has technology called Speed Send. This technology does a byte for byte comparison and only sends the differences in the file. This works great when sending Visual FoxPro executables that have a small set of bug fixes or enhancements. We have seen executables around 8MBs ship in a minute or less over a slow dial-up connection and it works fabulously over high-speed Internet connections. It is almost as if you were running the computer directly.

Figure 9. File transfer feature of pcAnywhere in action.

There are issues with this technique of delivery and support. If you do not have a reliable connection and it keeps getting dropped (usually when less than 500 bytes of a multi- megabyte transfer remain ) the customers tend to get cranky. We have customers that connect through a firewall and will not allow a pcAnywhere connection via TCP/IP. Those computers running a personal firewall like Zone Alarm or BlackIce are also a problem if they are not configured to allow access to the remote software. Sometimes we require a modem on the troubled systems. Some corporations have Security Departments that refuse to allow any sort of connection to computers at their facility. We have found this to be a problem, but in working with them and explaining the reasons for the package, we can usually find some compromise.

The biggest issue with pcAnywhere is it is single-threaded. This means you can only support or transfer files to one computer at a time. This is not an issue for a small customer, but it does not work as well in an environment with numerous computers needing the application installed.

There are other remote application services also available. We have not used any of these, but they have become popular and are worth mentioning in case they might be of benefit to you. They are services you access via the Internet, and have fees associated with the service (usually monthly as well as annual plans). All of these have file transfer capabilities (some better than the others) in a similar fashion to pcAnywhere as well as the remote desktop capability so they can be used to deliver files and perform technical support remotely. A couple of them have the ability to manipulate the desktop from Personal Digital Assistants (PDA). They are not cheap, but they might be just what you need.

Note ‚  

Information and marketing details for Expertcity ‚ s GoToMyPC can be found at www.gotomypc.com , LapLink Everywhere's can be found at www.laplink.com , and I'm InTouch at www.imintouch.net .

Terminal Services and Citrix

Citrix and Terminal Server ( Figure 10 ) are products that allow several virtual computers to run on a Windows NT box. This allows something like a dumb terminal or a regular PC to connect and have all the applications run on the server. This connection can be established with all the conventional mechanisms like an internal network using standard network protocols, a modem, and via TCP/IP on the public Internet. This configuration allows companies to use outdated computers like an 80286 or better to run powerful applications developed for the current Windows OS platform.

Figure 10. File transfer available in Terminal Services and Citrix (shown here) via the drives mapped to the local client computer in Windows Explorer.

The client computer has software loaded that makes the connection to the virtual computer on the server. This connection works similar to the pcAnywhere product discussed earlier. The big difference is the Citrix and Terminal Services product allows multiple connections to the ‚“server ‚½ computer. Once connected, the session maps peripherals like printers and drives on the client computer. Having the local drive mapped as a drive on the ‚“server ‚½ allows developers to transfer files to and from the server. Once the executable files are transferred, they can be installed. You can run the installation procedure or the customer can run it. Because the work is done on the server there is no network traffic generated other than the screen updates.

This situation is ideal when supporting customers that struggle with installation procedures. It also allows you to easily support them when they are not close to you geographically . This is simple to set up and works very reliably. Our client base does have customers that use Citrix, but this is not common.