The whole portable applications concept to me is brilliant. This site has contributed to this greatly, therefore my thanks.
There is just one big issue that has plagued this concept from the beginning, and that is the fact that relatively cheap flash-drives handle great numbers of small files like crap.
Interested in portability as i am, in research I came across Thinstall (http://www.thinstall.com). Pretty good program. But there is one aspect that they manage very well, and that is this. Every application gets compiled into one single package and upon launch it gets loaded into the pc's ram with much higher speeds than allot of small files.
That begs the question if there is a way to package application like firefox, thunderbird, etc in this same way. I realize this poses a problem as to how it writes/stores configurations, but if these are the only files that need to be launched separate from the application-package, it probably won't impact the much higher load times very much.
If anyone is familiar with software already existing, please inform.
Please excuse my second language.
Thanks allot.
Regards,
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From what I've seen, Thinstall does a couple of things. One is that it creates a virtualized environment, with a high degree of isolation between the running app and the host computer. In that virtualized environment is a virtualized filesystem where all the little files get written, and from where they are accessed. (In other words, I don't think they are all run entirely from RAM. The main executable is, but lots of other executables and data files are created and accessed on the file system, at least on the one or two I've had a chance to look at, even though there is just one main executable.) If that virtualized file system is on a fast hard drive, it will work quite well. I think, further, that changes to those files need to remain accessible if a subsequent run of the Thinstalled program is to have access to them. If the virtualized filesystem is removed (while the program is not running), the thinstalled program reverts back to whatever condition it was in at the beginning. One can use ProcMon or ProcessExplorer to see where the virtual filesystem is and which files are being accessed.
If we are talking about, say, Firefox, I don't think a Thinstalled version would violate licensing on the face of it, at least not the way it would if we were talkign about, say, Microsoft Word. Since Thinstall is extremely expensive, I imagine the biggest harm would be to one's wallet. On the other hand, if one entity purchased Thinstall and made Thinstalled versions of Firefox (again, as a highly unlikely example), copies could probably be given away for free, once all the "free" software licensing and trademark issues are worked out. (In other words, I think Thinstall would have no trouble once their licensing fee is paid, so only the Mozilla folks might have something to say about whether their software can be so tightly integrated into the Thinstall environment without violating their license.) I'm not advocating that we do that, just imagining what some of the issues might be if it were tried, and pointing out that the licensing issues may not be trivial.
I like the idea of a virtualized environment that has a high degree of isolation from the host computer. Thinstall might provide a model for one way to do it, or lessons for developing something better.
MC
On the other hand, if one entity purchased Thinstall and made Thinstalled versions of Firefox (again, as a highly unlikely example), copies could probably be given away for free
From Thinstall.com:"ditribution fee applies"
"Those people who think they know everything are a great annoyance to those of us who do." Asimov
I meant that if the entity took care of the Thinstall licensing fee, and the software that was "thinstalled" didn't have fees to begin with, that it could be distributed. Thinstall isn't doing the retail marketing of the finished app; it only wants its fees.
Where you are going to find an entity to take care of those fees is another story.
MC
They used those Open Source apps to make demos to show off how the Thinstall software works.
They can be downloaded from the Thinstall "Demos" page.
ps --
If you decide to use them, add a folder inside the app folder called Thinstall. That will stop the app from writing to the host pc Documents & Settings/ Application Data folders.
I just tried their MFF2.0.0.9 at:
[link to site hosting illegally packaged software removed by moderator JTH]
I must admit I was impressed. I could not figure out where it was keeping it's settings till the next launch till I read your post about creating the "Thinstall" directory.
I added a couple of extensions and it remembered them on the next launch. I'm not sure how portable it would be as the sub folders "seemed" to have an absolute path but I really couldn't tell.
I tried it on a public machine. I'm not ready to try it on one of my own machines or portable drives till I get some feed back from someone else about how safe they think it is in terms of "malware" and perhaps things left behind that I can't find.
There seemed to be a lot of disclaimers about the relationship be Thindownload and Thinstall so I'm not sure of legality of things [like if they have Mozilla approval]
If I read the agreement properly it looks like it is only a 30 day trial
But still it was impressive.
John, Ryan, Simeon, anyone, feed back?
Tim
Things have got to get better, they can't get worse, or can they?
They're using trademarks without permission (read: illegally). If they had permission, they'd have license and a statement like "Mozilla®, Firefox® and the Firefox logo are registered trademarks of the Mozilla Foundation and are used under license." on their site.
Also, you can't package GPL and similarly licensed software (Miranda, 7-Zip, Tuxpaint, etc) up into a proprietary binary like Thinstall does. It's a violation of the license (read: also illegal).
In short, it's an illegal software download site and can't be linked to.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
The Thinstall data folder is usually in AppData (in the user profile) or in the same directory with the executable (which means it is relative and portable).
MC
They were able to get JRE running for IE. They have a flash demo at the site.
Simple answer is privacy. The reason it is slower when running is because it is reading and writing your bookmarks and cookies files from the flash drive. We could copy these locally and copy them back to improve run-time performance at the expense of longer start times (much longer with larger profiles and data) and longer close times. But, you'd be leaving bits of your private data behind on the local machine that could be recovered by others.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
A ramdrive would be even faster. I remember seeing a post a while back something to that effect.
Have an Awesome Day!
Well, you'd still have to copy stuff from the flash drive to the RAM drive, and then back again when you are done. While it is in RAM it would be faster than a hard drive, but the initial overhead would probably at least make the startup time comparable, plus you risk losing your changes if the USB drive is removed before the changed settings are copied back.
In a lot of cases a Flash drive is way slower than a hard disk drive, so even though a RAM drive is faster still, there might not be enough difference to notice between copying the profile from the Flash drive to the hard drive versus copying from the Flash drive to the RAM drive (and even more so when copying back, because
If you are talking about one of those mechanical USB drives, it might not be worth worrying about a RAM drive or even copying to the HDD.
MC