Comments on: Custom AIR updater interface using ApplicationUpdater

By: Mister

Mister — Wed, 05 May 2010 23:58:49 +0000

Yeah, the code still had a few errors when I released it, I have also used the code and modified it in my own projects for the project needs. This code should serve as a good starting point.

By: Jonathan Kaye

Jonathan Kaye — Wed, 05 May 2010 22:49:38 +0000

I forgot to mention the additional conditional, it would be something like:

1
2
3
4
5

if(!updaterDialog){
createDialog(UpdaterDialog.NO_UPDATE);
} else {
updaterDialog.updateState = UpdaterDialog.NO_UPDATE;
}

By: Jonathan Kaye

Jonathan Kaye — Wed, 05 May 2010 22:40:09 +0000

I modified the code so that it only shows when an update is available. However, I noticed you have a condition in statusUpdate() which I believe needs another check:

1
2
3

else {
if (showCheckState) createDialog(UpdaterDialog.NO_UPDATE);
}

If there is no update, then event.available is false and the conditional falls to the statement above. However, if showCheckState is true, when you issue createDialog(), it will fail because createDialog() has the following check:

1	if(!updaterDialog) { ...

Therefore, if the showCheckState is true, it will ask the user if they want to check for updates, but if there is no update available (event.available == false), it will try to createDialog() which will not touch the dialog (and hence not say that no update is available, nor destroy the check for update dialog). Please correct me if I’m wrong about this!

By: Mister

Mister — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 19:35:14 +0000

Thanks for your contribution! It always seemed strange to me that you have to set some of the vars before the window is open, maybe the resolved that with Flex 4.

By: Rich Thibault

Rich Thibault — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 19:30:27 +0000

Man, this was working great for me until the final release of the Flex 4 SDK, and then all of a sudden my updater dialog started coming up empty – you could just barely see a sliver of the black dialog background in the lower right of the window. After much hair-pulling and gnashing of teeth, I found that just moving the open() up higher in the createDialog function, right after the constructor, fixed it.

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18

private function createDialog(state:String):void
{
if(!updaterDialog) {
updaterDialog = new UpdaterDialog();
updaterDialog.open();
updaterDialog.isFirstRun = this.isFirstRun;
updaterDialog.applicationName = this.applicationName;
updaterDialog.installedVersion = this.installedVersion;
updaterDialog.upateVersion = this.upateVersion;
updaterDialog.updateState = state;
updaterDialog.description = this.description;
updaterDialog.addEventListener(UpdaterDialog.EVENT_CHECK_UPDATE, checkUpdate);
updaterDialog.addEventListener(UpdaterDialog.EVENT_INSTALL_UPDATE, installUpdate);
updaterDialog.addEventListener(UpdaterDialog.EVENT_CANCEL_UPDATE, cancelUpdate);
updaterDialog.addEventListener(UpdaterDialog.EVENT_DOWNLOAD_UPDATE, downloadUpdate);
updaterDialog.addEventListener(UpdaterDialog.EVENT_INSTALL_LATER, installLater);
}
}

By: Custom AIR updater interface using ApplicationUpdater | Adobe Tutorials

Custom AIR updater interface using ApplicationUpdater | Adobe Tutorials — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 03:22:39 +0000

[...] This means you have to build your own user interface to handle updates. This might actually be a benefit in the long run as you may want to customize your application updater to match your application Go here to see the original: Custom AIR updater interface using ApplicationUpdater [...]

By: Mister

Mister — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 00:24:40 +0000

The namespace is as it is because I used Adobe AIR 1.5.2 to create this example. ApplicationUpdater and ApplicationUpdaterUI have been around for a while, they were a later add-on in AIR 1.0.

By: Erik

Erik — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 00:17:03 +0000

Thanks for this example,

I got only a bit confused by the namespaces which Adobe is “using”.
For the air framework 1.5 the namespace in the update.xml in the app.folder is
http://ns.adobe.com/air/framework/update/description/1.0,

Is this because the air sdk 1.5 -version was the first version where they implemented the ApplicationUpdater / ApplicationUpdaterUI ?
Or is this just a formality of Adobe?

Logically I would think namespace ending on 1.0 is air framework 1.0, namespace ending on 1.5 is air framework 1.5 etc .etc.
But might be wrong here. Just was wondering why.

Another question I have, would it be “wise” to pass the base-url of the configuration.xml to the appUpdater when an Update is available? In that way you could (if desirable) change the download-location for the update.

That would be passing the baseURL to the constructor of the updateManager.

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16

public function UpdateManager(showCheckState:Boolean = true, initializeCheckNow:Boolean = false, baseUrl:String = null)
{
this.baseURL = baseURL;
...
}

private function initialize():void
{
//trace("initialize");
if(!appUpdater){
appUpdater = new ApplicationUpdater();
appUpdater.configurationFile = configurationFile;

if (baseUrl !- null){
appUpdater.updateURL = baseUrl;
}

Thanks for the clear tutorial…
That was exactly what I was looking for.

Erik

By: Mister

Mister — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 23:42:56 +0000

Damaged AIR file usually means that the certificates are out of sync or the version you are installing is not the same as what you had in your update.xml file. At least, that has been my experience . Also check that users (well, its probably you) have permissions to install the application, etc. The last resort is, you have to totally uninstall all remnants of your application from the system, even the stored application directory. Sometimes things get corrupted and trashed during testing. You can follow these steps to uninstall Adobe AIR completely:

http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/403/kb403150.html

By: Jonathan Kaye

Jonathan Kaye — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 23:33:34 +0000

Thanks so much for sharing this!

I have a critical situation in which I need to check for whether the user has pressed INSTALL NOW or INSTALL LATER (essentially, my app closes the main window to open a new window, and it closes the main window and then the update occurs, I get an error about damaged AIR file — go figure).

Using ApplicationUpdaterUI, I don’t get a chance to listen to the events from that INSTALL NOW/INSTALL LATER dialog, as far as I can tell. If I go your route, I can easily find out.

I really appreciate it!