Hi everyone.

I have a Windows WPF application which I share for free from my website. It is distributed rather simply by zipping all the files up into a self-extracting 7zip archive and uploading to the website.

Most users have no problems in downloading the self-extract, running it to unzip it to their hard drive, and then running the application executable itself. However some users are unable to run the program because it's never been digitally signed.

Could someone tell me briefly how digital signing works, and how a one-man hobbyist developer can get one and sign his application so that Windows trusts it and lets it run?

This looks pertinent: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/252226/signing-a-windows-exe-file​

I used it to sign Internet Explorer and Firefox plugins, year ago, and I doubt that much has changed since then. Good luck sir.

You already have an option in your Visual Studio project config to add a certificate to sign your .NET application. Just head to the project settings of your WPF application and visit the Signing tab to either create a self-signed application or add an existing certificate file to it.

Rebuild, zip it and provide a hash-code for very suspicious users to have your zip verified