I created a MFC VC++ graphics program. I would like to make this program downloadable to anyone interested in trying from my website. How do I prepare such a file? and make it available from my site?

Makoto Honda 21 Reputation points
2022-11-04T22:54:32.337+00:00

I created a MFC VC++ graphics program. I would like to make this program downloadable to anyone interested in trying from my website. How do I prepare such a file? and make it available from my site?

C++
C++
A high-level, general-purpose programming language, created as an extension of the C programming language, that has object-oriented, generic, and functional features in addition to facilities for low-level memory manipulation.
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  1. David Lowndes 4,711 Reputation points
    2022-11-05T10:08:45.78+00:00

    It depends what your program needs on others machines and what you want the end-user's experience to be.
    If your program is a stand-alone EXE (statically linked), and needs nothing else, you could just zip it and instruct people to download the zip, unzip it somewhere and run it.
    If your needs are more complicated and require a setup program to do other things, such as install any dependencies, set registry keys, create start menu links, etc, then have a look at the Microsoft Visual Studio Installer Projects or a 3rd party installer such as Inno setup.

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  2. Makoto Honda 21 Reputation points
    2022-11-05T18:21:58.82+00:00

    Thank you very much for the info. My CAD program (using free VS2019 community) is a DLL-based program using MFC and OpenGL. I do have 10 or so DLLs to run my CAD program. I just cleanly built a x64 / release version of my program.

    I just did download and install VS Installer. Now, how do I go about creating a project?

  3. Makoto Honda 21 Reputation points
    2022-11-05T22:41:55.823+00:00

    Thank you for all the good links. Very helpful.
    I did this some years back once and I could not remember all the details of how to create a msi file.
    I looked at my old document and I was able to create a downloadable file for my CAD system just now. I used VS Installer, not ClickOnce.
    I put it on my web --- www.honda-e.com/CAD-download.htm

    I tried it and it worked for me. I do not know if someone without VS installed in their PC can successfully run this program. I have to test using some else's PC....

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