Long ago I remember seeing posts recommending against auto-updating portableapps and specified that they should be only updated using the portableapp installers. If allowed to auto-update, the apps supposedly began to leave some files in the local profile. Obvsiously this doesn't apply to ALL apps.
What is the current consensus for this? Do we let them update themselves or turn it off and do it manually?
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It's still recommended to not let apps update themselves. While there are certainly apps that wouldn't have their portability broken by letting them update, you can't know if/when they will break portability/functionality until after you've already done the damage, so it is preferable to wait the day or two until there is an official paf of the updated app.
The best way to "AutoUpdate" apps, is to use the latest version of the PortableApps.com Platform (currently 2.0 Beta 5) and use the updater (Manage Apps > Check For Updates) every once in a while.
~3D1T0R
Thank you both for your replies.
Unfortunately 3D1T0R's option isn't really usable for me because I'm not using the suite and I don't care for the PA start menu system. My drive is encrypted and I use PSMenu because it handles the trueccrypt mounting and dismount, usb dismounting, and is more customizable for my needs. The PA startmenu looks quite nice but just doesn't have the features i need.
I might play around with the suite to see if i can extract whatever is managing updates, but until then I'll just stick with with either leaving update notifications on so i know when to go check portablesapps.com or just disable them and check by myself on occasion.
I do think this is an issue that should be addressed. A functioning update feature should be part of the requirements for a portable app imho.
Have you tried 2.0 Beta 5?
If not I recommend you do so, you might like it better than you did the previous versions, it's different.
AFAIK the updater is self-contained in the
X:\PortableApps\PortableApps.com\PortableAppsUpdater.exefile, but the installers (which it downloads and runs) won't run in silent mode unless the PortableApps.com Platform is running too, so unless you use the PA.c Platform you'd have to manually Next your way through each update.~3D1T0R
What about using the platform just for updating? It's just under 5MB and completely unobtrusive when not used.
You could start the updater (PortableAppsUpdater.exe) as well manually or with psmenu. I would leave the PortableApps.com folder otherwise unchangerd to be sure everything works as intended.
I'm going to see if I can try your second option of running the updater via PSMenu. I really don't want to add a second menu system on top of PSMenu just for the sake of getting everything to update properly, hopefully this works...
Thanks everyone.
Not on top.
just leave it alone so long as you don't need i for updating...
The PA.c Updater may work, though it won't understand where a custom document directory is set or what language to appear in (it will get those from the platform). It also won't be able to have the installers run unattended, which does mean you'll be clicking Next in the installers. (In unattended mode, everything is hidden and automated except for EULAs that a user hasn't yet agreed to, meaning you can usually walk away and it'll just run). The unattended installer bit requires the Updater to be run from the platform and the platform to still be running, though.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
For a while I had 2 versions of the PortableApps.com Menu, the latest PAM r## Mod, Liberta AutoStart, PStart, PSMenu, and some "Portable Start Menu" program that I no longer remember the name of (that was actually kind of cool, I should see if I can find it again some time) all running every time I used my FlashDrive (not autostarting, I just liked to use certain features of all of them).
Having two menus on your FlashDrive won't kill you (or your flashdrive).
I really recommend trying out PortableApps.com Menu 2.0 Beta 5, you really might like it.
~3D1T0R
I run Appetizer as my main dock, with about 10 apps on it, including PAP. If I want a less used program, or think there are updates, I fire up PAP. Works great. In my opinion, absolutely worth it.
I am not my signature.
While the current philosophy is to rely on the PortableAppsUpdater, I think it would be great if official apps could have a version checker built into the Launcher, that would give you the option to update an outdated app from the PA.c repository at the time of launch.
I made this half-pony, half-monkey monster to please you.
We have no plans to do this as you'd wind up with lots of individual EXEs trying to make external connections (which will be very annoying with some software firewalls). The updater handles updates, so there's not much need to duplicate that same code in dozens or hundreds of individual launchers.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
Sorry for the cluttered and delayed response.
Aside from the reasons John stated, can you imagine having to run every app just to see if you have any updates? I think centralized updating like John has done is a better solution
Good points.
I'm slightly confused why the updater would need to know where the document folder is, is that where the update files are stored during download?
Any chance of making a standalone version of the updater that allows for unattended use and can fetch the language from an .ini or something along those lines? I definitely see the attraction of the platform but not all portable app users are using it that way.
For the time being, i have thinned down the platform folder to just the updater & english locale and it weights in at about 319K, not bad at all. Works great other than the silent install problem you mentioned but i can live with that.
I'd like to see some form of version locking added, similar to hiding updates in windows update or locking a package version in linux. Occasionally new versions come along that are a step backwards and it would be nice to prevent them from being checked on each update (I'm looking at you, Skype 5)
Agreed, but this is not just for me, it's for more than 150 other users i teach and many of them are just beginning to use computers for the first time. English is also not the first language for any of them. Having the platform running in addition to the PSMenu would absolutely baffle a few of them.
It's just not an option, these are truecrypt protected drives used in a rather hostile environment and the PA platform doesn't integrate with TC at all. It has improved greatly from earlier versions though, you're right.
You do not need to integrate truecrypt with your menu, nor should you, actually as that will be less secure. When used properly, TrueCrypt is installed on a drive and then the platform and your apps are installed inside it.
Also, TrueCrypt offers no protection against malware, spyware, keyloggers, etc, so it should absolutely not be looked at as any kind of protection within a hostile computing environment.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
Nothing sensitive is kept on the "outer" unprotected partition, the actual usb drive. Only the PSMenu system, truecrypt executables and 2 anti-keylogger/malware apps. I created a launcher .exe that sits in the root that launches PSMenu. The antimalware apps help, but of course don't guarantee, that the system they are using is clean enough to go ahead and open their TC drive.
When PSMenu is launched, it launches truecrypt first and prompts for the user's pw and mounts the tc partition, then the menu is placed in the tray and the apps contained in the partition are available. When they're done, they click close and PSMenu closes apps that are on the tc partition, dismounts the tc partition, closes psmenu and finally safely ejects the USB drive.
How is that less secure? Someone can inspect PSMenu and see what apps are on the TC partition which isn't ideal, but it's a small price to pay for the ease of use it offers these people.
Nothing offers complete protection, but to say that truecrypt does not offer any kind of protection is simply not true. Lost/stolen/confiscated drives etc. are essentially unrecoverable if the user has an adequate password and this system allows them to run portable anti-malware apps before mounting a partition that might contain sensitive information.
That's not quite what I meant, so I apologize if it seemed it. Of course, TrueCrypt provides security in terms of losing your drive or others accessing it. My point was that the stuff outside of it is infected as soon as you plug it into an infected PC (including TrueCrypt portable). And that once you open it, everything inside can be infected, copied locally, etc. From this second post, you seem to realize that, though, so I apologize for my confusion.
It's worth nothing that if you're running on potentially hostile PCs that, for some reason, give you full admin rights there are other things to be concerned with, of course, like driver-level keyloggers that won't be detected by many scanners. Public PCs with admin rights available are kind of a disaster waiting to happen and I've personally never encountered that situation.
We'll have a solution that automates much of this in the near future. It will most likely involve FreeOTFE as it has FreeOTFE Explorer as a backup for when you don't have admin rights (there is no TrueCrypt equivalent).
The updater will at some point cease to function without the PA.c Platform running. In the next release, a simple warning will be shown if the PA.c Platform is not running to inform the user that it's not running as intended and could malfunction. It's not designed or tested to be launched directly, so we'd like to ensure that if problems do occur, users are aware of why.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
You make an important point and one its one that I try to make sure students understand: once truecrypt is mounted it's just like any other drive and equally vulnerable. A vault with the door open is just a room.
Admin rights on cafe pcs are the norm here for the most part, probably due mostly to ignorance on behalf of the cafe owners. Some of the cafes just re-image the machines at the end of the day and start fresh. By law they are required to have screen capture software on each machine and grabs screenshots at 5 minute intervals which in turn get passed on to the powers at large. Unfortunately keyloggers are common as well and hard to detect. The 2-step login gmail offers and hotmail's one-use passwords are a little bit helpful in this regard. KeePass helps as well, though I haven't had a chance to test how good the clipboard protection actually works.
A system that worked without admin rights would be awesome, but i was under the impression that you could only do that with OTFE explorer which won't allow executing portable apps. Are you working on a way around that? If so... wow! Sign me up as a tester.
Regarding infection, i'm in the process of developing a system using NTFS permissions that locks writing abilities to executables and assigns a null owner to the files(s). A second unlocker script reverses this when updates need to be done. A smart piece of malware could simply take ownership and re-allow writing but luckily we haven't seen it yet. Just another stumbling block to place in the way of the dark side, i'm sure they'll wisen up to it eventually.
It's disappointing to hear that the updater will stop working in future versions. I hope you'll give some consideration to the benefits of making the updater work independently but capable of communicating with the PA.c platform. Aside from people who use different menu systems like us, I know many who run portable apps from drive C to make moving from PC to PC easier and reduce the hassle of OS installs. They generally just drag the launchers into the windows start menu rather than running the PA.c menu from the tray. Knowing that they can just grab their portableapps folder and drop in the the new system saves loads of time. They too would need the PA.c platform only for updates. It's not extremely difficult to run the PA.c platform to access the updater but it seems like an unnecessary step imho.
Thanks again for all your work on PortableApps.com, you've changed the way people use computers forever and make much of what I do possible.