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Main Area and Open Discussion => General Software Discussion => Topic started by: kalos on February 17, 2011, 02:41 PM

Title: how to make every app portable?
Post by: kalos on February 17, 2011, 02:41 PM
hello

my goal is to have each of my favorite software portable, ie. in a folder with all the settings gathered there, without altering the PC or OS when I run them from their folder

I want to save time installing and configuring from the begining my apps, when I get new PC or new OS

which solution do you recommend?

thanks
Title: Re: how to make every app portable?
Post by: Ath on February 17, 2011, 02:52 PM
http://portableapps.com/
Title: Re: how to make every app portable?
Post by: timns on February 17, 2011, 02:58 PM
Isn't that just a collection of apps that happen to be portable?

I think the only true way to take your setup with you would be as a complete virtual PC running in virtualbox or similar.
Title: Re: how to make every app portable?
Post by: timns on February 17, 2011, 03:02 PM
By the way, this has no right being a word:

Portablization

 :wallbash:

Title: Re: how to make every app portable?
Post by: Ath on February 17, 2011, 03:25 PM
Isn't that just a collection of apps that happen to be portable?
-timns (February 17, 2011, 02:58 PM)
Yep, but there's a quite huge collection already. Most likely all the OP needs is there :D
I think the only true way to take your setup with you would be as a complete virtual PC running in virtualbox or similar.
-timns (February 17, 2011, 02:58 PM)
That would have 2 disadvantages:
Title: Re: how to make every app portable?
Post by: Deozaan on February 17, 2011, 03:32 PM
Get VirtualBox on PortableApps.com (somehow), then buy a 64GB USB drive and use it for a portable VM with everything you want installed on it! :P
Title: Re: how to make every app portable?
Post by: timns on February 17, 2011, 03:49 PM
Exactly, yes, is 64gb "big" nowadays?

I'd be doomed without a hell of a lot of very specific software that I suspect would never be made portable - and in fact DCers saved my bacon a while back by helping me create a virtual PC that held some protected software from a company that went out of business without the decency to lodge their code in escrow.

So unless one's needs are quite basic, a simple suit of portable software is always too much of a compormise to be useful. But then again, I'm old and inflexible  >:(
Title: Re: how to make every app portable?
Post by: Deozaan on February 17, 2011, 04:09 PM
Exactly, yes, is 64gb "big" nowadays?
-timns (February 17, 2011, 03:49 PM)

Well I was thinking of a thumb drive. I guess you could put it on an external HDD or SDD and get up to a couple TB of storage for your little Portable PC. :)

Another alternative is to get some sort of Linux distro installed on an external HDD and then wherever you are just boot from the USB drive rather than the internal HDD.
Title: Re: how to make every app portable?
Post by: KynloStephen66515 on February 17, 2011, 04:20 PM
By the way, this has no right being a word:

Portablization

 :wallbash:


-timns (February 17, 2011, 03:02 PM)

Ty...that actually made me laugh...while saying it out loud  :D

+1
Title: Re: how to make every app portable?
Post by: kalos on February 17, 2011, 04:50 PM
okay but option for portable version should be present to all apps
Title: Re: how to make every app portable?
Post by: fenixproductions on February 17, 2011, 05:00 PM
Isn't that just a collection of apps that happen to be portable?
-timns (February 17, 2011, 02:58 PM)

Yes it is but there is also JauntePE application forum board:
http://www.portablefreeware.com/forums/viewforum.php?f=16

This software can make any application portable (similar to TinyApps or Sandboxie).
Title: Re: how to make every app portable?
Post by: 4wd on February 17, 2011, 05:25 PM
Threads here which may be of interest:
Cameyo (https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=24021.0)
JauntePE and others (https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=15705.msg141953#msg141953)

I'd give Cameyo a try since JauntePE is no longer developed.  EDIT: My mistake, I really should keep up with these things.

Note, these are application virtualisation - if you want a completely portable application they have to be coded that way from the start AFAIK.

By the way, this has no right being a word:

Portablization
-timns (February 17, 2011, 03:02 PM)

Damn straight!  It's Portablification.

 :P
Title: Re: how to make every app portable?
Post by: barney on February 17, 2011, 05:31 PM
You could take a look here, http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/create-portable-app-flash-drive/.

I haven't tried it, but Make Use Of generally is on the mark.  Be certain to read all the comments on the how-to article.

This process is on my to-do list, but it'll be a week or three (3) before I have time to mess with it.  One caveat is that not all apps will fit this process ... you'll just have to try it with the apps you cannot live without, see what happens.
Title: Re: how to make every app portable?
Post by: kalos on February 26, 2011, 04:46 PM
FYI here are some interesting links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portable_application#See_also

but are there any data regarding the performance differences between a portable version of an app and its regular version? if there are not any, then it seems that every program should be portable, there are no real advantages of being installed
Title: Re: how to make every app portable?
Post by: Hyphen on February 26, 2011, 09:05 PM
Get VirtualBox on PortableApps.com (somehow), then buy a 64GB USB drive and use it for a portable VM with everything you want installed on it! :P
-Deozaan (February 17, 2011, 03:32 PM)
Is this a legit idea? That sounds pretty awesome, does VBox portable run smoothly?
Title: Re: how to make every app portable?
Post by: Ath on February 27, 2011, 04:10 AM
Both Novell ZEN Application Virtualization (http://www.novell.com/products/zenworks/applicationvirtualization/) and VMWare's ThinApp (http://www.vmware.com/download/thinapp/) Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VMware_ThinApp) offer application 'portabilization', by packaging an entire application and it's required environment into a single exe. At a tradeshow (2009) I got an USB key holding a ZEN packaged OpenOffice installation (it sure was not the Portable OpenOffice!) to try, and it works just fine. Nothing to install, nothing to clear if you need to get rid of it, just run it.

That's a whole lot lighter then running a portable VBox instance.
Title: Re: how to make every app portable?
Post by: kalos on February 27, 2011, 10:09 AM
nothing to clear if you need to get rid of it, just run it.
-Ath (February 27, 2011, 04:10 AM)

umm, you mean "just delete it" ??
Title: Re: how to make every app portable?
Post by: Ath on February 27, 2011, 10:20 AM
umm, you mean "just delete it" ??
-kalos (February 27, 2011, 10:09 AM)
Nope,
Nothing to install, nothing to clear if you need to get rid of it, just run it.
-Ath (February 27, 2011, 04:10 AM)
Re-phrase: Nothing to install, and nothing to clear if you need to get rid of it, you can just run it whenever you need it.