Question

I am writing a little application in android which would have a server part in .Net (C#). Obviously I want to target maximum number of end users, without having to deal with no framework installed issues.

I was wondering which .Net framework should I target for my app ?
Or which version may I expect to be most definitely there on a user’s machine ?

Thanks,

Answer 1

Or which version may I expect to be most definitely there on a user’s machine ?

This really depends on your user base.

If you want to target all platforms, you can’t guarantee that any reasonable version will be there, so your deployment should include a check and installation of the framework. Note that, if you know your user base is typically on Windows 7, for example, you can guarantee that they’ll have .NET 3.5, but if some are using XP, there is no guarantee, as no version was included with XP.

Personally, I would just target the version that you wish, and always include a framework installation. The “cost” of including the check to install the framework, especially if you use the web installer, is very small – much smaller than the development cost of targeting an older framework version and limiting yourself to a less rich development experience.