Hi,
I must say my knowledge is quite limited and I apologise if the answer to this question is obvious, but I don't understand why some applications such as VirtuaWin or Notepad++, which are already portable, are packaged into portableapps.
Actually I never understood why programs need to be "installed" - perhaps it is needed for non-free softwares (to avoid the software being easily replicated on another computer), but why do most open source softwares also need to be installed?
Yes I know it creates shortcuts in the Programs menu and on the desktop, but that doesn't sound like a good reason!
Cheers
Jean
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It's been discussed a few times, see some examples here (portable installer) and here (advantages). Also note that most of the zipped apps we package are not fully portable (some leave registry entries, temp files, file associations, have their most recent files list break, etc). Some apps are fully portable (VirtuaWin, for example), but the format still makes it easier to install into the platform and it works with our built-in updater (zip files do not).
PA.c Format is an open, standardized format for portable software with many advantages over ZIP files (as indicated in the links above).
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
In the article What is aportable app? there are a listing of the typical features in the section "Portable App Guidelines". Among other things there is mentioned the following sentence: "A portable app doesn't leave registry entries behind except those automatically generated by Windows".
But how can I find out, what are registry entries automatically generated by Windows?
Exist there an easy and typical recognition feature regarding these Windows registry entries?
Windows will keep certain things like what was run in areas of the registry that are not writable to non-admin users. It will also store prefetch files for each thing run that are similarly not removable by non-admin users.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
Thank you John for your answer.
I am now convinced to use PA.c apps every time it is possible.
Thanks a lot to all the people working on portableapps. I don't know why apps needing an installation are so widespread whereas it's actually possible to do without, as your work shows.
Most of the apps here do still need to be installed, it is just that the Portable Apps Installer and Launcher makes it so that the installation data is removed from the computer it is originally installed on, and then silently copied to any computers you then run that app on, making the computer believe it is installed.
I should have written "a dirty installation" instead of "an installation".
...are the funnest apps to make portable
Some of them have quite a bit of registry stuff and internal stuff to rewrite.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
Sometimes "Already Portable" apps, are not "Actually Portable" apps.
One must always check.
~3D1T0R