2

Any windows uwp "experts" here?

I've been researching on the below mentioned topic for a day now as I couldn't believe there is no way that we can distribute our UWP App.

Is it really not possible to distribute an UWP App through a different channel than the store without having to manually run+interact with the powershell script? Because we can't really do that for our customers everytime. They also do not have admin rights and are not allowed to use the normal windows store.

Just installing the certificate and then running the appxbundle does not work, we always have to run the powershell script in order for it to work... :/

byemute
  • 643
  • 7
  • 15
  • Did you tired to use remote powershell? Install the bundle for all users. After a reboot the user should see the app – guiwhatsthat May 14 '18 at 14:00
  • But then we have to do it manually, that's kinda what I'm trying to avoid. Would be fine to do it once, but the app may have been uninstalled or it's a new device and then we have to manually execute the powershell script again. They also usually do not have admin rights so the powershell script may not even work... This is mainly for distributing to company devices which do not allow store access and no admin rights. – byemute May 14 '18 at 14:10
  • Why should the users need admin rights? you want to distribute the app right? When you have a list of computer you only need to start the script once and it cloud install it for each computer. – guiwhatsthat May 14 '18 at 14:13
  • Hmm, If I do it locally it seems I need admin rights for the powershell script otherwise the installation is failing. And yeah, I'm talking about giving an easy way to companies distributing/installing it – byemute May 14 '18 at 14:18
  • If you run the "Settings" app, seach for "developer", click on "developer features", and then enable "Developer mode", does that allow your app to install? – Greg Thatcher May 15 '18 at 04:39
  • Not without running the powershell script :/. I also see there is a new .appInstaller way but we can't use it as we're stuck on Build 14393 and it's not available there yet – byemute May 15 '18 at 08:49
  • @byemute You an try to use the [SCCM](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sccm/apps/understand/introduction-to-application-management) to deploy appx packages. – Breeze Liu - MSFT May 16 '18 at 02:25
  • Maybe this can help? https://stackoverflow.com/questions/50326370/install-package-appxbundle-via-appinstaller-to-all-users-on-machine/50327934#50327934 – Bogdan Mitrache May 16 '18 at 10:47

2 Answers2

3

UWP-apps that are not from the store need to signed with a trusted certificate. Otherwise the installation will not be successful.

If your app is correctly signed and the certificate is trusted, you can double-click the .appxbundle to install the app on more recent versions of Windows 10.

The powershell script only needs admin rights because it adds the temporary developer-certificate to your trusted certificates.

marv51
  • 366
  • 1
  • 11
1

First off you need to create a certificate and sign your appx/appxbundle with that.

You have have to install the Certificate on your Clients Machine but for that you need Admin rights. So you have to give your client the certificate and they have to distribute it via Group Policies. That way you don't have to install the certificate via the powershell script.

Now you can write a script that will install the Dependencies and Appx on the Machine. For that you don't need admin rights, but side loading must be activated. But like I said the Certificate has to. be installed otherwise you can't not install the App.

evandrix
  • 6,041
  • 4
  • 27
  • 38
nani
  • 183
  • 2
  • 15