Alerting the end user to the fact that a new version is available, BUT only showing information about it.

[dms]

Hi

I've been using AI for years now and make great use of the update facility. However I no longer use AI's own inbuilt licensing as there are certain things it doesn't do.

I would like some advice and possible suggestions on how to achieve the following. Programs are granted a perpetual license, Maintenance and upgrades however are based on a subscription model. It is easy for me to extract the required subscription expiry dates and simply prevent AI from downloading updates after that time. I would like to show end users whose subscription licences have expired details about the new versions as they become available (in fact what I'd like to show them is the list of features, enhancements and Bug Fixes that I normally add to the updates.txt file when I create a new update.

Can you suggest an easy way to extract that information from the updates text file such that it can then be displayed in a dialog that I create?

Many thanks

Dom

[Daniel]

Hello Dom,

We don't have out of the box support for your request, but as a workaround you can try to download the updates configuration file (hosted on your server), parse its content and extract the useful info from there. The download link to the updates configuration file (hosted on your web server) can be retrieved from the INI configuration file which resides next to the installer Updater tool.

To learn what to search for when parsing the updates configuration file content please take a look on our "Updates Configuration File" article.

If there is anything we can assist you with just let us know.

All the best,
Daniel

[dms]

Hi Daniel

Your suggestion works very nicely, and I have been able to display the information from the updates text file and a button for a down load option to request the update enabled (or not) on a simple Boolean validation comparing release date with the support date embedded in the license. The final piece in the jigsaw would be how then call the AI updater to download and install the latest update (I make use of the updaters ability to close the currently running application) and have it check the validity of the download. Is there a way to call it absolutely silently with no dialog once one has determined that there is a valid update available?

Dom

[Daniel]

Hello Dom,

Yes, you can use an Updater silent command line like /silentall.

If there is anything we can assist you with just let us know.

All the best,
Daniel