Does Continuous/Automated Deployment make any sense for desktop applications?

Question

I'm currently starting reading the book Continuos Delivery by Humble/Farley and while a lot of stuff in there makes sense, there one thing that's nagging me:

It does seem the authors are solely targeting server-based (single-client?) applications (like webapps) with their treatment of what things to do and to avoid wrt. automating the build process, the testing, the deployment.

Looking at the questions tagged continuous-deployment it does also seem the term is only used in context of server-based applications.

So, I was wondering, does automating stuff after "the setup" (talking of a windows app) for a desktop app has been created even make any sense? The "deployment" of a desktop app is always user-driver, so what kind of sense would it make to automate anything here -- and, really, what stuff could be automated that made any sense?

_{Oh, and btw. I'm entirely unsure whether this question would be better put on programmers.SE, so feel free to move it there if you think it would.}

Answer 1

Please check the link: http://timothyfitz.wordpress.com/2009/03/09/cd-for-client-software/ which talks about Continuous Deployment for Downloadable Software.

Answer 2

The short answer is Yes. If you are developing custom code that's running on desktop PCs in your organization then it would be possible to automatically push the latest build which has passed all tests to all client PCs.

However you would almost certianly need to ensure that the deployment process was not disruptive to the user experience; this would be something which had to be considered when designing the application. Also, you would need to ensure your network could support pushing the necessary files to those machines X times per day. Desktops typically not are connected as well as servers.

Answer 3

We have the same problem. We'd like to be able to continuously deploy our desktop apps.

Google have an open source library called Omaha they use to help silently update Chrome. It takes quite a bit of work to get as seamless an experience in your own app though.

We're actually building a service that will hopefully make it much easier to continuously deploy any desktop application. We're trying to speak to as many potential users as possible at the moment to make sure we build the right thing. If you're interested you can find out more at QuietDeploy.com

Apologies for the self promotion, but hopefully it's of some interest.