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PortableApps In The Cloud(Dropbox)

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t-unit
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PortableApps In The Cloud(Dropbox)

I have discovered a new medium for carrying my portableapps with me accross all my computers without having to remember my thumbdrive, dropbox. So long that I have an internet connection I can store my apps on a real time cloud storage service this means that I don't have to upload everything again every time I put it in the folder. I have used this successfully and I am inviting you all to do the same.

You can find it here here

I hope you like this Idea If you have any questions please let me know.

Bruce Pascoe
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Neat in concept...

...except you have to install the Dropbox software on all the computers you want to use it with. Fine if you just use friends' computers, but what if you're on a public computer and don't have administrative privileges. Or suppose you happen to be on a machine without Internet access (rare nowadays, but not unheard of)? Thumbdrive still wins, IMO.

t-unit
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I know but Even in the house it can be a hassle to us a UFD

I know but even in the house it can be a hassle to us a USB flash drive. And this works pretty well. Plus if you checkout my blog you can get 256MB of bonus storage for you account when you sign up from there. [self-promotional link removed by mod JTH]

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NathanJ79
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Blocked

Also what if the public terminal or work/school computer has Dropbox blocked? Granted, flash drives can be blocked as well, but the former situation is much more common.

Flash drives and portable hard drives are the most convenient solutions. Hard drives win on speed and capacity; flash drives win on size and discretion.

And about flash drives being a hassle, all I can say is LOL. If you want smaller, you can go down to microSD up to 4GB, I think, and I think you can even get a card reader that reads them without an adapter now, but flash drives are the "right" size and just about every PC now has at least two USB ports out front.

crux
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More public terminals block Dropbox than block Flash drives?

That's surprising.

NathanJ79
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Not surprising

No it isn't. Blocking flash drives is relatively new and is generally only practiced, so far as I've heard, by the government and corporations dealing with sensitive data.

Blocking web sites is a lot more common, and the corporate net nanny programs tend to be very conservative. Ironic that I can get on YouTube and Facebook but not Dropbox? Maybe. But in any case, I'm sure it's not just me; as I understand it, one company's net filter isn't just their own; rather than task IT with censoring the web, they just subscribe to a filter that a lot of companies use. Like your ad blocker's filter or PeerBlock's filters. Works better that way.

RobertMilk
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Access Dropbox via web access

You have the ability to access DropBox and your files via web access. It is not a smooth as with their client, but you can still access them.

PeteNeTLive
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Dropbox Portable

Heres some more information that might be helpful,

[Link removed - contains illegal redistribution of Dropbox, please remove it from your site - mod Chris]

gmbudwrench
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If your interested

There are pros and cons, but more about this here:

https://portableapps.com/node/17396

digitxp
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Portable

There's actually Dropbox Portable that runs off a flash drive, but requires .NET. I use that a lot.
I would put my apps in my Dropbox (I plan to when I eventually get a checking acct.), but the problem there is that 2GB isn't going to fit anything in it.
(On a side note, dropbox moved to dropbox.com a while ago because they won a lawsuit.

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spg SCOTT
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Dropbox portable...

I like the idea of this, but it is problematic...it has hooked explorer for it's context menu and wont let me remove my drive...

And I haven't even started it today (rebooted without removing the memory stick...)

Now I know what John means when he says context menus can't be done because of this...

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3105891/Pics/Capture.GIF

In future, am I able to kill explorer? (It is a separate process to the standard explorer process, so not the one running everything else - I think)

“There is a computer disease that anybody who works with computers knows about. It's a very serious disease and it interferes completely with the work. The trouble with computers is that you 'play' with them!”Richard Feynman

spg SCOTT
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STUPID EXPLORER HOOKS

Does anyone know how to remove these?

Even after several reboots, and not running the app for ages, it seems these will NOT go...still there preventing me from removing the drive...

I wish I hadn't tried DropBoxPortable... Sad Sad Sad

P.s. Yes, I know it is not supported, but I just simply want rid of the hooks...

EDIT: nevermind, I used the zip download of unlocker to unhook them...can now remove the drive...

“There is a computer disease that anybody who works with computers knows about. It's a very serious disease and it interferes completely with the work. The trouble with computers is that you 'play' with them!”Richard Feynman

spg SCOTT
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Ugh...

Crashed explorer though...

(Sorry for the manic posting...wont happen again ;))

“There is a computer disease that anybody who works with computers knows about. It's a very serious disease and it interferes completely with the work. The trouble with computers is that you 'play' with them!”Richard Feynman

dwebb5
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Great post. I already have that.

It was published over a month ago.
15 Hacks Every Dropbox User Should Know
http://www.maximumpc.com/article/features/15_things_you_have_know_about_...

It's working fine for me.
I saw no use for Cloud until this.
I got tired of updating two browsers and all the Portable Apps.
This way I can update my EEE netbook PC and not even have it turned on.

I have my 250MB bonus also: [referral link removed by mod JTH]

t-unit
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Apperently You are not supposed to post referals on the forum...

You aren't supposed to post referals on the forum... I had the same thought but if it against the rules then so be it... Provide a link from your blog or something...

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dwebb5
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Working on my EEE PC

I posted several storage sites on The EEE forum.

OK, twice you removed my link but left the one above:
"Plus if you checkout my blog you can get 256MB of bonus storage for you account when you sign up from there. My Blog is here if your interested!"

t-unit
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Dropbox Portable Works Great With Autostart

The Portable Dropbox I Used was found http://forums.dropbox.com/topic.php?id=7729 It works very well and the auto-start option in PortableApps 1.6+

I would like to state the obvious and say that the portableapps forum doesn't want the use of referrals on the forum. I am going to say that this is generally a good position to keep the sites validity solid.

[Once again, if you put a URL in an <a> tag without specifying the href attribute it will make it not a link - mod Chris]

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digitxp
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.NET

The only problem I found with it is that it needs .NET, but other than that it works great (been using it for 6 months now).
(BTW I'm pretty sure that only self-promotion is a problem here--all the forum links are tagged with nofollow).

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RobertMilk
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DropBox

I, too, use DropBox, but I use it for back-up and as an easy way to keep my KeePass data readily available to sync with my Motorola Droid. There is KeyPass for the Droid which uses the same format data file.

My understanding is there may be DropBox for the Android OS under development.

Disclaimer: I have no vested interest in the company that develops and maintains dropbox.

Bob

edwilli
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Trouble the Open Office 3

Anyone having trouble with OO3 and dropbox? I get the splash screen than it just locks up. It looks like dropbox is trying to sync OpenOfficePortable\Data\settings\user\uno_packages\cache and is conflicting maybe with open office?

Has anyone else had this?

John T. Haller
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Path?

What path do you have it installed to? It can't handle a path like X:\Users\USERNAME\Documents\PortableApps\OpenOfficePortable\etc... it's too long. It needs to be X:\PortableApps\OpenOfficePortable or shorter.

Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!

portableapps_member
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My concern with this is

My concern with this is privacy. Entrusting your private data on someone elses server is risky. Thumb drives may be a hassle when you need to sync/update your apps, but at least your information is safe.

marko
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I have 2 PortableApps on the

I have 2 PortableApps on the same USB HDD

The first is my "Open" PortableApps which has all the utilities I 'need' for which privacy is not an issue. It also has Firefox but this version has is intentionally disabled for privacy, and only there for use when you are not a sys admin and never used for secure purposes (business,purchases etc).

The second is my "Secure/Private" PortableApps which lives on a TrueCrypt volume - this is where fully enabled Firefox, and other privacy requiring apps and private storage live.

This was set up purely for the occassion where somehow you lose your USB drive - You might have lost your hardware but your privacy is securely locked up in the TrueCrypt volume.

When you dismount the TrueCrypt volume you can back it up on local drives (I do this at home and work) and you could also store that safely on the cloud.

t-unit
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API to be released soon...

The Dropbox API will be released soon so perhaps a portableapps menu plug-in could be created for the portableapps platform when it is released.

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caue
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both pen and box

people arguing against each: why not using both the pen drive and dropbox? it's what I'm trying to do at least:

https://portableapps.com/node/17667#comment-158472

bronder
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Dropbox + Portable apps for disaster recovery

Ive been using Dropbox for a while now, and portable apps even longer. However I tend to use the same computers over and over so I installed portable apps on my dropbox folder with the most common apps there. Since the dropbox drive is small I don-t install all the portable apps Ive downloaded, like games ans such.

Recently I had accident with my notebook puter with my USB stick attached to it. Both got damaged considerably.

While my drive is backed up with carbonite, the restore is taking a long while. However all my portable apps on the dropbox file were readily accesible to me, with the documents there too.

I think portable apps on a dropbox folder is a great combination that you should promote more. It will never get damaged. Im planning on making it my primary source of apps, and make a regular copy to my USB drive for when using in a public computer.

Thanks to the portable apps team and the dropbox team

Aciago
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Same here

I also use Dropbox to keep my PortableApps (Tunderbird in my case) but I use it just for the Data folder (using links), that way I always have my Thunderbird (installed in a computer with linux, in a computer with windows and in a portable drive) in sync.

Chrome and Firefox have their own sync solution and the rest of Apps I just have backups in a portable Hard Disk.

If a packet hits a pocket on a socket on a port,
and the bus is interrupted as a very last resort,
and the address of the memory makes your floppy disk abort,
then the socket packet pocket has an error to report Biggrin

Daniel Brvnišťan
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Syncing Chrome using Dropbox not built-in sync solution

Hi. The Chrome's built-in sync feature is nice but still it does not sync everything for some reason. For example the opened tabs, history and most visited sites. And these are quite important. If I have a page opened on one computer and then I want to see it on another, I have to bookmark it first and remember the bookmark. But I want to close the browser on one computer and have it either opened or remembered in history on the other one.

So I tried to put my Chrome portable into Dropbox folder to see how it works. The opened tabs work as well as history and other things. But for some reason it disables my extensions. They seem to be still installed and activated but are shaded gray in the Extensions tab and the buttons are missing or saying "page not found" when clicked. Seems they are missing their files.

There are also lots of conflicted copies of various files in the Chrome instalation has probably something to do with it.

I have no idea how this happens and how to fix it. Any ideas? Thanks.

jamisonlofthouse
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How about Google Docs

I was having trouble with dropbox so I did a bit of research and found out that Google docs can be mounted as a filesystem. I first saw a application called google-doc-fs but that didn't work. I then saw Gladinet and used that. Visit this website: http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/20262/mount-skydrive-s3-google-docs-and-o.... After you follow those instructions install portable apps to your cloud drive. You may be able to use other cloud systems but I haven't tried the others.

Jamison

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UNRELIABLE

1) almost all online storge providers have security issues

DROPBOX publically wont release the type of security they use.and they also have said that their employees can access your data

2) Its pointless to use any applications that really matter through a web interface,all it takes is one disconnect from your portable apps drive while using it through dropbox and your installation or files become corrupt

Any interruption in your Internet connection to the apps in your dropbox while your using them is the equivalent of unplugging your usb stick while using it

ergo "not a safe portable apping technique"

If you want to backup your portable apps installation online Lacie provides the most secure storage and even has 1gb for free

ignaciospisso
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RAIDRIVE

Use either dropbox, google drive, onedrive, etc... From a local folder by installing RAIDRIVE. Its like a LAN folder for each cloud service you have. Way easier... You can even install/run from the computer without having to download it...

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