PortableApps.com Format and Installer 0.91 Comments

My antivirus (Norton Internet Security) Detects /app/bin/makeheader.exe as Suspicious.MH690.A, which is a Heuristic Virus.
Norton has deemed the virus' risk rating as high.

Read up on Suspicious.MH690.A, here.

The user should be allowed to specify where the Installer should be created especially If you are making an installer on the go. For instance I would like the installer created on the Desktop but the source folder is on the USB stick.

...will the newest format, in its Win7 compatibility, prevent Windows from asking "Did the installer complete successfully?" every time a portable app is closed? Not all of them do it, but some do, and it's kind of funny, being that NSIS is for installers, and PA makes what amount to "anti-installers", as I like to call them. Well, anything that confuses Windows amuses me, unless it winds up harmful, and this isn't.

Hi I've been using portable apps for a few months now and my opinion is that I am so impressed that I've moved everything I can to a portable app. I hate installing anything if I can help it. I use the MOD though as I have so many apps (around 80) that I need the categories!

Anyway, I was just wondering, what is this Installer for exactly? I understand it's a dev tool, something I know little about, but are you trying to develop a way of allowing any fool, like me, turn any OS app into a portable app?

Keep up the good work,

Scott

My first impressions are quite positive. Easy to use, haven't hit any bugs yet, and I agree that the red sidebar graphic is awesome

I have tested my Blender Portable 2.49 Developement Test 2 and it compiles perfectly with Installer 0.91.0 but errors on Installer 0.91.1. The log shows that there is an error on line 1651 of the PortableApps.comInstaller.nsi and yet it does not exist in the Blender Portable source folder for me to review?

Edit
I now see whats going wrong after looking at both packages:
0.91.0 has File /r "..\..\..\${APPID}Optional1\*.*"
0.91.1 has File /r "..\..\Optional1\*.*"

....

Um..

Why did you do this in the new release?

My file used to be called

EclipsePortable_C_C++_Edition_Development_Test_8.paf.exe

Now it's...

EclipsePortable_C_CPlusPlus_Edition_Development_Test_8.paf.exe

???

What's with the new PlusPlus thing?

AppInfo.ini

The [Control] section says "Start is the command line to execute for the main application". When I wrote my launcher I expected to be able to pass options to it, e.g.

[Control]
Icons=2
Start=AppNamePortable.exe
Start1=AppNamePortable.exe
Name1=AppName Portable
Start2=AppNamePortable.exe /debug
Name2=AppName Portable (Debug Mode)

But it seems all I can put here is the name of the executable file, so I had to use another program here (AppNamePortableDebug.exe). Are there any plans to support command-line options here?

installer.ini

I'd like the [DownloadFiles] to be handled as an option so the user can decide whether or not to download the extra files. At the moment my installer offers a basic install plus an optional component for extra language files. It would be nice if a third option could be added to control whether or not to download the files specified in the [DownloadFiles] section.

I'm having a problem extracting files into the correct folder after downloading. I'm downloading a zip file which contains a folder and the files I need are in that folder -

zipfile.zip\folder\files

[DownloadFiles]
AdvancedExtract1To=App\AppName\destinationfolder
AdvancedExtract1Filter=*

or -

AdvancedExtract1Filter=folder\*

Gives the same result - App\AppName\destinationfolder\folder\files

What I want is - App\AppName\destinationfolder\files

What am I doing wrong?

EDIT:
I presume extracting from an EXE isn't working at the moment, as I can't get that happening either...

Perhaps it would be more logical to have the Installer initiate a prompt to change the version number when it is in the wrong format (x.x.x.x)

Um...

It still deletes the Optional1 in the AppNamePortable folder.

Hi John,

my USB stick is mounted as drive "B:" nowadays. When I install new apps or never versions I have to insert drive and main folder (B:\PortableApps) by hand.
When it was mounted as e.g. "F:" the installation path was "auto recognized".
Any ideas, why it won't work with drive "D:"?

Thanks for your great work guys,

x_ray

Please add in the PortableApps.comInstaller.nsi file the line:

!define 'MUI_FINISHPAGE_TITLE_3LINES'

before of line:

!define MUI_FINISHPAGE_TEXT "$(finish)"

Please do this for which the space is insufficient for the text of the final page (The whole text does not appear), in some languages as: Spanish, international Spanish, etc.

The language selector displays the standard PortableApps.com Installer Icon. What about having it display the Applicationś icon?

I just think it would be nice.

Would it be possible to integrate AppCompactor into the Installer so that the user can optionally compact the App directory prior to creating an Installer for it? Would eliminate the need to manually open AppCompactor, compact the program, then run installer.

If this is possible, it would be nice to select the options to compact the program using whichever settings are chosen, browse to program's directory for creation of an installer, review the settings that were chosen (AppID, Version, etc.) and then with one click, have the program compact the portable and then package it. All in one app.

unknown variable/constant "{NAME}" detected, ignoring (LangString runwarning:1041)

PortableApps.com Format 0.91 (2009-06-24) does not mention any restrictions on the characters which can be used in DisplayVersion; it merely states "DisplayVersion is the user-friendly version that is generally used to describe the version. So, a released app may have a DisplayVersion of 2.4 Revision 2 but a PackageVersion of 2.4.0.2."

I am still working on my launcher so I added " (beta 1)" to the end of the DisplayVersion text and tried to package my app. Installer 0.91.7 appeared to go into an infinite loop. Its window showed "Generating installer code..." and the progress bar started moving. However after 10 minutes nothing else had appeared in the window though the progress bar had reached about 90% and the CPU load was still roughly 50%.

I terminated the process, removed the "(" and ")" from the DisplayVersion text and tried running the compiler again. This time the "Creating ...." line appeared about one second after the "Generating installer code..." line and the app was packaged within 22 seconds.

I think the specification needs to spell out which characters can be used in the DisplayVersion entry.

Hello,

I got an error after trying to package one apps

Processed 1 file, writing output:
Adding plug-ins initializing function... Done!
Error: could not resolve label "NONE" in function "PreWelcome"
Error - aborting creation process

What could be the source of this error and how to solve it ?

Thank you for help,

Have a nice day !

I was wondering one thing about the PA.com Format.

Is there anything in the launcher that allow to define the language of an application (if it support it obviously) to the one configured in the Platform?

If not, is there any plan to do so?

Since some users are installing PortableApps on multiple devices - say, a local (or local but external) hard drive, as well as a flash drive, maybe they have a backup of the suite on their phone as backup - some, but not all users are likely to have multiple installation environments going on at the same time. For one example, when I install Firefox, I install it three times. Folder for me on local hard drive. Folder for my wife on local hard drive. And then my flash drive. She has a flash drive as well, and if it's around, make it four times.

My suggestion is that when you're telling the installer where to install, perhaps in addition to the raw path, perhaps above, there could be a drop-down list of devices that the PortableApps.com Platform is installed in (StartPortableApps.exe is found on the drive's root, or a .ini file as a placeholder for the Suite being installed farther down). Select my external hard drive and it shows both Portable Firefox folders (and perhaps, the version number in those folders).

Then perhaps allow the end user to install to either folder - or, perhaps even both/all folders it found.

This would be a cool feature for if you're setting up a few flash drives to hand out at a party or meeting or something. Have half a dozen flash drives plugged into your system, and set them all up simultaneously.

Something very much like this should be in the works for hardware partners. They're gonna want an easy way to deploy the latest version of the apps to each drive. Maybe there's a faster way, when they're being built they get loaded or something, but it seems like that should be doable.

Just thought I'd point out, at home, I have a couple portable apps from The Blog That Shall Not Be Named, and one of them impressed the hell out of me the other day. Did something the apps from here don't, and I couldn't believe that they added a feature to the PortableApps.com format, as opposed to just hijacking the logo and name.

The app started up, and a notification popped up telling me the version I'm running, the latest version, and gave me a clickable link to the newest version.

Part of me was troubled that they were calling home. What else was being transmitted, I wondered. But then I thought, if the portable apps vendor is trusted (as this one, the official one, is), it shouldn't be a concern.

More importantly, I wondered why that hack had such a cool feature when the official PortableApps didn't.

Maybe when the version of the Platform with the updater comes out, the format could be updated to include an update check?

To clarify: this is not a version update check, this is a portable version check. Nevermind this guy's on the updates like white on rice (had Notepad++ 5.5 and VLC 1.0.2 out the day the author published them), the updates link back to his blog, to the post with the newer version.

Not wanting to start a new topic, I ended up here by the link of topic 'PortableApps.com Format™ 1.0'

Anyway, I just came across some odd behavior of the PortableApps.comInstaller 1.03

I have set the installer.ini to 18 different languages and they all seem to work as long as the compiled installer can read the language environment variable.
But when I ran it straight from the desktop, as expected asks me what language I want to use. But only get a choice of 10 languages.
The installer.ini contains the following entries:

ENGLISH=true
DUTCH=true
FRENCH=true
GERMAN=true
ITALIAN=true
JAPANESE=true
KOREAN=true
POLISH=true
PORTUGUESE=true
PORTUGUESEBR=true
ROMANIAN=true
RUSSIAN=true
SIMPCHINESE=true
SPANISH=true
SPANISHINTERNATIONAL=true
SWEDISH=true
TRADCHINESE=true
TURKISH=true

But when running the installer, the following languages aren't shown as an option:

JAPANESE
KOREAN
POLISH
ROMANIAN
RUSSIAN
SIMPCHINESE
TRADCHINESE
TURKISH

Ps.:As well, as all (other) languages are written in the native language (like 'nederlands' for dutch). French is just shown as 'french', probably should be 'français'

I am trying to build my own portable apps. Since the version 2.0 came out my new and updated apps that I create or update myself will not launch anymore from the menu.

Using the PortableApps.com Launcher creator tool I never get any error reports after making a launcher. But they do not work. Nothing gets launched when I click on the PortableApps.com menu icon of the application. Then when I go to the folder of the portableapp itself and click on the Launcher the app will correctly launch.

Does anyone have any idea what can cause this ?
Can you please take a look at the log text file I uploaded, and see if I did something wrong:

h#ttp://wikisend.com/download/536478/PortableApps.comLauncherGeneratorLog.txt]PortableApps.comLauncherGeneratorLog.txt

Remove the #