KB Article A4
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How to deploy WinForms applications on client machines

Description:
What are the installation steps required for registering/using DevExpress WinForms products when deploying a WinForms application to a desktop?

Answer:
Here are all possible variants of our DLL deployment.

  1. There is no need to redistribute our XML files. They are only used at design time.
  2. You should redistribute those DLLs which are referenced by your application. By default, all our DLLs are located in the "<Program Files>\DevExpress XXXX.X\Components\Bin" folder ("<Program Files>\DevExpress XXXX.X\Components\Sources\DevExpress.DLL" for versions prior 11.2). You can use our Assembly Deployment Tool, which is shipped along with our components to get assemblies that are necessary for your application. You can find a standalone version of this tool for older versions of our controls in the following article: A tool for collecting the required DevExpress assemblies for further application deployment.
  3. When installing your application, you can place our DLLs in the same folder where your distributed EXE is located.
  4. Another approach is to register them in the Global Assembly Cache (GAC) using the Gacutil tool.
    Note: Distribution of our design DLLs which end with "Design.dll" is prohibited.
    See Also:
    How to distribute applications that use DevExpress .NET Windows Forms controls
    How to deploy applications based on the ASPxGrid
Show previous comments (7)
DevExpress Support Team 3 years ago

    Hello Scott,

    We have recently fixed this issue in the context of the above-mentioned ticket. We are preparing a hotfix. I added that ticket to you favorites so that you receive a notification once the hotfix is ready.

    SB SB
    Scott Bergeman 3 years ago

      Aleks,
      Thank you.

      Are we talking hours or days? Need to know so I can work around this temporary setback.

      DevExpress Support Team 3 years ago

        Hello Scott,

        Usually it takes up to a few business days to prepare a hotfix. The hotfix for this issue is ready and published. As another possible workaround consider deploying your application with the help of one of the previous versions of Visual Studio.

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