Challenge Overview
Installation of our application is invoked via an html page which (a) contains logic which automatically downloads and installs Java Web Start (JWS) onto the user's desktop and (b) provides a link to a custom JWS configuration file (.jnlp). When launched by the user, the custom .jnlp file is configured to (a) install the needed version of JRE onto the user's desktop (if required), (b) install desktop and startmenu icons for launching the application onto the user's desktop and (c) install the application files onto the user's desktop (the files are downloaded from a source web server and onto the user's desktop).
The installation of updates to our application (new releases and/or bug fixes) are also managed via the same JWS configuration file (.jnlp). Every time the user launches the application using the icons installed on his desktop (or even if he launches the link to the .jnlp file on our install html page again after the initial installation), the .jnlp file is configured to check to see if any of the application files installed on the user's desktop have been updated on our source web server. If they have, the user gets a prompt that informs him there are updates and ask if he would like to install those updates. If the user answers, "yes", the updated files only, are downloaded from our source web server and onto the user's desktop.
Final Submission Guidelines
Refer to the wiki spec:
http://apps.topcoder.com/wiki/display/~standlove/Download+Tracking+Tool+PoC+Assembly