Big Picture vs Squirrel.Windows
Squirrel is a set of tools + library to manage installation and updates for Windows desktop apps.
What Squirrel is optimized for
Section titled “What Squirrel is optimized for”- Developers building Windows desktop applications
- Self-contained updater workflows
- NuGet-based packaging in the Windows ecosystem
Where Squirrel is strong
Section titled “Where Squirrel is strong”- Developer-friendly, self-contained updater workflow
- Familiar packaging via NuGet in the Windows ecosystem
- Simple integration pattern for Windows apps
Where Squirrel differs from Big Picture
Section titled “Where Squirrel differs from Big Picture”- No multi-tenant policy plane
- No vendor-controlled mirror story
- No license server / leases
- No enterprise “MANAGED_BY_IT” mode unless built separately
- Framework-level; does not provide enterprise policy or tenant governance
- Licensing and regulated mirror distribution are out of scope
How Big Picture differs
Section titled “How Big Picture differs”- Big Picture provides an enterprise control plane for release governance across products/tenants
- Big Picture offers explicit tenant policy + action decisions (AUTO_INSTALL, NOTIFY, MANAGED_BY_IT)
- Big Picture combines release governance + update policy + licensing in one coherent control plane
- Big Picture is designed around regulated downstream customers who require self-hosted artifact mirrors with signed metadata
Complementary integration
Section titled “Complementary integration”- Big Picture’s control plane can decide which Squirrel release to offer and whether it’s allowed to auto-install
- Big Picture can govern Squirrel-based updates with enterprise policy and staging controls
Suggested positioning
Section titled “Suggested positioning”“Frameworks provide the local updater mechanism; Big Picture provides the enterprise governance layer that makes self-update acceptable to IT and safe at scale.”