Introduction
If you visit the DotNetNuke downloads page you will notice that there a number of installation packages available. In this article we will introduce each installation package, and discus which package you should use.
The Downloads Page
| Figure 1: The Home page of DotNetNuke.com |
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The Home page of DotNetNuke.com has a panel of Quick-Links icons. One of these icons links directly to the DownLoads page. If you click on the Downloads icon you will be redirected to the Downloads page. (Note: in order to see any downloads on the Downloads page you need to be logged in as a registered user. If you have not registered on the site, there is a Register link on the grey band immediately below the "Quick-Links" panel).
At the time of writing there are four different versions available for download; 4.3.4, 4.0.3, 3.3.4 and 3.2.2. These represent, respectively the last two public releases for .NET 2 and the last two public releases for .NET 1.1. You will need to determine which version to download.
| Figure 2: The Downloads available for DotNetNuke v4.3.4 |
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The downloads available for v4.3.4 are shown in Figure 2. There are six downloads in total for this version, 4 installation packages, a documentation package and the Module Upgrade Wizard. The 4 installation packages will be described in more detail below.
Install Package
The Install Package contains the files needed to deploy (or Install) DotNetNuke. The user controls used on the website are included as ascx files with their relevant codefiles. The library components are provided in the /bin folder of the website as assemblies - ie they are already compiled.
This package is ready to deploy. It should not need to be compiled (or built). This package can be used by developers who do not have any interest in seeing the source code for the library components. It also has the advantage of being compatible with Visual Web Developer, which is available as a free download from Microsoft.
StarterKit Package
The Starter Kit is a special configuration of the Install package that can be installed into Visual Studio 2005 or Visual Web Developer to provide specially configured templates for developing with DotNetNuke. There are four templates included in this Starter Kit.
- A website project template. This template can be used to create a "copy" of the Install package.
- Two module item templates (one in VB.NET, the other in C#)
- A skin item template
We will go into more detail on how to use the Starter Kit in future articles.
Source Package
The Source Package contains the complete source for each class library project. While the Install Package included these class libraries as compiled assemblies, the Source Package includes the full source code for these class libraries. As a result, this package needs to be compiled (built) before it can be deployed.
This package can be used by developers who would like to see (or edit) the source code for one or more libraries. As this package contains non-website projects, it is not compatible with Visual Web Developer and developers who wish to use this package will need to use Visual Studio 2005 Standard or higher.
Upgrade Package
The Upgrade Package is similar to the Install Package except it does not contain a "web.config" file as it is intended to be used by users who already have an early version of DotNetNuke deployed, and are just interested in upgrading their site to the latest version. It is designed to upgrade sites based on the Install Package or Starter Kit - not on the Source Package.
Conclusion
This article describes how to obtain a DotNetNuke Installation package. It also provides a description of each of the available packages.
For More Information:
For more information on Installing DotNetNuke please see the "DotNetNuke Installation Guide" included in the Documents Package.
About the Author: Charles Nurse is the owner of Keydance Computer Services, the sponsor of this site, as well as being a Trustee and a Lead Developer in the DotNetNuke project.