Impressive Beta

[Steven Carr]

IR Guys,

This really looks like a good update to VP.

And for a beta it is really stable and works well.

It is easy to see that you have put quite a lot of work into the differencing area - and it will stop checking differences as soon the accumulative sum of patches get larger than a full install. :)

Excellent job :yes :yes

[Corey]

I am also impressed, particularly with the intellectual savate of the Lorne. That guy's operating at a whole other level. :yes

Visual Patch 2.0 and the technology behind it are going to carve out a significant niche which will surprise and amaze many onlookers, I'm certain of it. :yes

[Steven Carr]

Also there are some nice little feature which make it a little easier like when you drag a selection of files in it will automatically set the KEY file when you have already defined a key file of the same name. :yes

[Mark]

Hi Steven,

I'm glad that you are enjoying this Beta. Thanks for all of your bug and suggestion reports they are very much appreciated.

[Lorne]

Thanks Steven. We really appreciate the testing you've done so far. I know not everyone has time to help test a beta and to get this much feedback right from the start is definitely a good thing. :)

Have you tried patching any large files yet? I've tested the patching engine on files above 1.5 GB but I'd like to hear from users who have aimed Visual Patch 2.0 at some large "real world" patching jobs.

[Steven Carr]

The general installs i have worked on are around the 5MB mark - i tried up to about 20 versions.

Generally i would not go beyond this as it is getting towards install sizes (still smaller which is pleasing, but it does get harder to administer).

I will review what other project i have and push the size boundaries. This will be where the cache would come into excellent use :D

[Brett]

Steven,

Startegy definitely comes into play when using Visual Patch. One thing we have been considering here is that in many cases it is better to make 2 patches:

- One that brings one version previous to the newest release (1.0.3.0-1.0.4.0)
- One that brings all old versions to the newest release (1.0.0.0-1.0.4.0)

Then let TrueUpdate decide which one to download and run. The assumption is that if most users always stay up-to-date then you will save a lot of bandwidth by maximizing the use of the binary differencing capabilities to make a much smaller patch as opposed to bringing along the whole file.

[Lorne]

Yeah, as you add more versions it can definitely approach the size of a full install. (Although for projects with very large data files the difference is usually more dramatic.)

I personally recommend a "two-pronged" approach for software updating, that uses two separate patches:

One patch from the previous version to the current version. This minimizes patch size (and thus bandwidth) for the majority of users, since they probably already have the previous version...especially if you use technology like TrueUpdate to keep them up to date.
Another patch for all versions, to be used in cases where the "previous-to-current version" patch won't do.
If you're using a tool like TrueUpdate 2.0 it's easy to decide which patch to download based on which version the user currently has installed. And if your patch distribution isn't automated--e.g. if the users just click on a download link and run it themselves--this approach provides a good balance between minimizing patch size and making things less complicated for the user.

Edit: heh, Brett beat me to it. :)

[Steven Carr]

The actual live updates i have going at the moment work with TU2 where i define in the constants 2 values:
- current version say 20050517
- patch update from, say 20050401

Then, when TU2 checks versions if it is before 20050401 then it will download the full install, else if it is before 20050517 it will download the patch, else latest version.

Every now and then i will put in a 3rd stage that will update only recent (say the last 2-3 releases).

Normally the patch versions will only include up to about 6-7 releases max.

With previous projects i did have more versions in VP1 but it does get difficult to manage.

Mind you it is *far* easier to manage with a tool like Visual Patch.