Deploy ClickOnce online installation filetree as a single .exe file for installing offline

Question

Any ideas how to pack ClickOnce online installation filetree in a single .exe file for installing offline? I know it's not designed for this purpose, but using Windows Installer is NOT an option for me, because I need just to RUN the app without any installation process (exactly as ClickOnce online installation works). I've tried IExpress tool for making self-extracting .exe, but unfortunately it doesn't support filetree. Can I use .cab packaging for this purpose?

Answer 1

If you want to run the app w/o any installation process, you can just copy the contents of the \bin\release folder into a folder on the target machine and set up a shortcut to the exe file.

Note that you will have to make sure the target machine(s) has(have) the right prerequisites installed.

OTW you can publish the ClickOnce app to a folder on disk, write the folder to a CD, and send it to the user. They can pop in the CD and run setup.exe to install it. You'll need to set the prerequisites to be installed from the same location as the deployment instead of from the vendor's website. You'll probably also want to leave the installation URL blank, and in the options for the deployment, select the option that allows you to NOT specify a deployment URL. What will happen is the C/O app will always look to the CD drive for updates (it uses whatever the path is when the user installs it).

You can also distribute it by CD and still put an update URL in the Updates dialog if the user ever has access to an internet connection.