go-update: Build self-updating Go programs

This is a fork of https://github.com/inconshreveable/go-update, that was made, because the original author does not seem to react on issues or PRs and I really wanted to have inconshreveable#35 fixed. Feel free to use.

Package update provides functionality to implement secure, self-updating Go programs (or other single-file targets) A program can update itself by replacing its executable file with a new version.

It provides the flexibility to implement different updating user experiences like auto-updating, or manual user-initiated updates. It also boasts advanced features like binary patching and code signing verification.

Example of updating from a URL:

import (
    "fmt"
    "net/http"

    "github.com/inconshreveable/go-update"
)

func doUpdate(url string) error {
    resp, err := http.Get(url)
    if err != nil {
        return err
    }
    defer resp.Body.Close()
    err := update.Apply(resp.Body, update.Options{})
    if err != nil {
        // error handling
    }
    return err
}

Features

• Cross platform support (Windows too!)
• Binary patch application
• Checksum verification
• Code signing verification
• Support for updating arbitrary files

equinox.io

equinox.io is a complete ready-to-go updating solution built on top of go-update that provides:

• Hosted updates
• Update channels (stable, beta, nightly, ...)
• Dynamically computed binary diffs
• Automatic key generation and code
• Release tooling with proper code signing
• Update/download metrics

API Compatibility Promises

The master branch of go-update is not guaranteed to have a stable API over time. For any production application, you should vendor your dependency on go-update with a tool like git submodules, gb or govendor.

The go-update package makes the following promises about API compatibility:

1. A list of all API-breaking changes will be documented in this README.
2. go-update will strive for as few API-breaking changes as possible.

API Breaking Changes

• Sept 3, 2015: The Options struct passed to Apply was changed to be passed by value instead of passed by pointer. Old API at 28de026.
• Aug 9, 2015: 2.0 API. Old API at 221d034 or gopkg.in/inconshreveable/go-update.v0.

License

Apache