What’s the best way to do a update?

Hi,

I found a problem using the toolkit. For example, I have version1 of an app that has a toolbar with buttons, in version 2, I added some custom controls to toolbar. It works well for people who did not used version1. But for people used version1, the new controls will not appear.

I think it's because the LoadCommandBars(...) reads the old settings in registry. Users with version1 has to goto customize dialog and 'reset' settings to see the new controls.

What's the best way to do a version update, so the users using version1 could keep their settings and be able to see new controls ?

Thanks in advance

I would just force toolbar updates upon reinstall. I would keep a registry entry under HKCU with your apps current version.  Read that on app-startup and if its less then the apps own version, delete the customization related registry keys, then write the apps current version over that same key each time, so that the registry key deletes only happen at upgrades.

There are other things that are not prompted for though (keyboard shortcuts, docking pane layouts) and some things you can change on the toolbars that will not cause the prompt to show up.  Most users won't know how to go into customize and reset each of the toolbars if they miss the one-time prompt, but most users can accept that upgrading from version X to version X+1 will reset their toolbars in the name of adding new features to them.
A happy user is a user who upgraded for feature Y and immediately sees the new button which he has just paid for, and an unhappy user is one who missed the prompt and can't find the button for the feature he just paid for and has to angrily email support to find out why he was just ripped off.

It could depend on your product, but my users are generally not very technical, and I know we would get much more complaints by not forcing the toolbar reset on upgrade.

I am a couple weeks away from delivering my first release using CodeJock.  Since it will by my first release I won't have to worry about the upgrade issue yet.  Although, by the next release I need to figure out a good way to do this, because I know my users are not going to like losing their customizations everytime they upgrade, but they will want the new stuff.

Most of my users will create new menus and toolbars but will not change the ones I supply.  So would it be best to skip the prompt, but recursively loop through the toolbars and menus and reset them?