http://sourceforge.net/projects/sbw/
I want to make this scientific application portable, but it is confusing to me how because it is a whole set of .exe's that depend on each other.
Could I get some guidance on if it is possible to package this as a portable app without any source code changes?
Thanks in advance.
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When you install it, does it create multiple shortcuts or just one? If it's just one, then create a launcher for that executable.
Previously known as kAlug.
There are multiple shortcuts. There are multiple exes that can depend on one another. How do I deal with that?
It's kind of like the MSFT Office suite, where you can run any combination of these programs, but they share certain services.
It also uses the registry, I've used regshot to make a comparison snapshot of what registries are changed, but I don't know where to go from there.
Try looking at the LibreOffice Portable launchers. It's everything I can tell you.
Previously known as kAlug.
Thank you for your interest in SBW, I went ahead and created a first version of a portable SBW. For more information see this post:
http://frank-fbergmann.blogspot.com/2011/12/sbw-goes-portable.html
Unfortunately it won't be possible to include it in the portable apps directory, as portable apps does not allow applications that include .net components to be listed (even though it is available on most systems these days).
We'll be adding a .NET apps section right here on the site and platform users will be able to tick a box in the PA.c Platform to have them show up right alongside other apps in the built-in App Directory. They won't be visible by default because most public PCs (net cafe, library, coffee shop) as well as many schools and some companies are running Windows XP without .NET installed.
.NET is only installed by default on Windows Vista and higher and most Windows XP users never install it as most standard apps users install (browsers, office suites, games, etc) don't require it. Many geeks do install it, though, as they use utilities or apps which do use it (I have it installed for an app that acts as a file manager for my cloud storage, for instance). But as .NET can't be legally portablized and end-users won't be able to tell whether a given .NET app runs or not until they actually are using a given PC, it makes for a poor user experience.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
Actually, it could be done by using mono. I admit there is a cost associated with it, but not more so than for Java. You'd have a portable version of the latest mono (http://mono-project.com). And when .NET is not available on a machine, the application would be invoked by launching it through mono (by simply prefixing the executable name with the mono command).
That way it would easily work for xp (and probably even below).
While Mono is decent, it doesn't emulate all functionality of the .NET framework. Some apps just won't work properly running from Mono as opposed to .NET.
Edit: Actually, I don't think many (possibly any) VB.NET apps could run under Mono. I just tested two I wrote, and they both error out on very simple standard calls.The Mono homepage doesn't say anything about VB.NET though, only C#, so Mono has even more limited usefulness for portability than I thought.
Edit 2: Hmm, strange. Mono's own tool for determining compatibility flags both my apps as having pretty much zero chance of working, but running them under Mono they work just fine, no missing functionality at all.