Comments on: ClickOnce and Expiring Code Signing Certificates

by: Paul Ballew

Wed, 19 Dec 2007 19:58:01 +0000

Nice solution. One comment though: the format string for getting the PublicKeyToken has a bug if there’s a 0 in the token. It will drop the 0 if it’s the first part of the byte. This code will fix it:

String.Format(”{0:x2}”, pk[i]);

Thanks Jim!

Paul

by: jim

Mon, 10 Dec 2007 23:35:58 +0000

Eric - try again, it should work now. I recently changed hosting companies and lost that file in the shuffle!

by: Eric

Mon, 10 Dec 2007 19:36:16 +0000

Hi Jim, Thanks for the blog, its been very helpful. Although the new sign tool technique is probably the way to go I’m still interested in your uninstall technique. However the link to ClickOnceReinstall.zip appears to be dead. Do you plan to make it available again? If so I’d like to give it a try.

PS Sorry for trying to register, I was confused!

by: jim

Tue, 25 Sep 2007 12:20:26 +0000

Michael, I haven’t looked at this in months and I don’t remember having a problem publishing with the old certificate. Sorry.

You may want to consider using this workaround instead:

http://blogs.msdn.com/danielma/archive/2007/03/19/clickonce-and-expired-certificates.aspx

It’s less “kludgy”, IMHO.

by: Michael Jones

Mon, 24 Sep 2007 20:57:16 +0000

I read your comment above: “I deploy an update with the old certificate that contains the GÇ£reinstallGÇ¥ logic”. I can’t understand how you are able to publish an update if the original certificate has expired. Did I misunderstand something? I am not able to update my app after the certificate has expired.

by: Freddie

Wed, 22 Aug 2007 05:49:16 +0000

Hey Jim, i just wanted to thank you a lot for your blog. it helps a lot. i have a question though, i incorporated your self-uninstall in my clickonce application. i noticed that it does not remove the application in the C:\Documents and Settings\user name\Local Settings\Apps\2.0 folder. unlike if you uninstall manually the application in the add/remove programs it clears the said folder. is it ok? thank you very much again. have a nice day! =)

by: Steve

Fri, 10 Aug 2007 13:01:31 +0000

Great piece of work and documentation. We have 140 locations with an average of 3 workstations per location. I’ve been using VS 2005 since beta 1. The Click-Once technology is terrific but, if anything goes wrong, you’re hosed. I have had the self-signing fail (you don’t know until it is deployed and tested) because I added components to the app that it didn’t consider the “same” as before. Lately, I have had to publish twice (bumping the ver each time) to get the clients to install.
Anyway, thanks for your info here. I will keep this link somewhere safe.

by: Jim Harte’s Blog » Blog Archive » Another Workaround for Expired ClickOnce Code Signing Certificates

Wed, 16 May 2007 18:01:29 +0000

[…] Daniel Margetic has posted a workaround for updating a ClickOnce application that has been deployed with an expired Authenticode certificate. I wrote about this problem back in January and came up with a kludge that involved automatically uninstalling the app and reinstalling from a new location. […]

by: jim

Wed, 21 Feb 2007 01:31:44 +0000

Johnny,

I did see the MS article while researching this. Unfortunately, I’m using a certificate from Thawte, so the C++ program won’t work in my case. That only works if you “self sign”. So, I opted for “method 1″

Thanks,
Jim

by: Johnny Funch

Tue, 20 Feb 2007 20:04:44 +0000

Hi,

I was originally going to use your suggestion above but luckily MIcrosoft came up with a ‘workaround’…

The solution above is only great if you can get to all the computers with the clickonce application installed. Ours is installed in cars with a very unstable GPRS connection…

Just so you know…

http://support.microsoft.com/Default.aspx?kbid=925521

The C++ program on the page above works well although it shouldn’t have been a problem in the first place

tnx
~j