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Wouldn't a better definition be "A portable application (portable app), sometimes also called standalone, is a program designed to run on a compatible computer without being installed, and with the ability to preserve user application settings across multiple computers (hence 'portable')".
The article may bit a bit too biased towards "leaving the computer's configuration information intact" (which in itself is rather vague), whereas the origin of the terminology comes from wanting to be able to carry and run an application, along with its user settings, from one computer to the next, and have it preserve its settings. As such, the current definition may create false portability expectation issues, especially for Windows users, who may equate "portable" with "not changing the registry at all".
Or do we mean to imply that, a standalone Windows application that does modify the "computer configuration" after usage (e.g. registry), but allows a user to carry its settings from one computer to the next (through the use of an INI file), is in fact not a "portable application"? PBatard (talk) 15:38, 19 September 2016 (UTC)
Does anybody have information about how to program portable apps? What are the guidelines, what programming environments on different platforms are suitable, etc.? 60.248.21.146 03:08, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
To create a portable app, run the setup file, and install the program a suitable location in the hard drive. Then copy the folder made by the setup file into the external drive. Then uninstall the original file, You will now have a portable app. This won't work for all programs, but it will work for most of them.
Hey guys, do you think putting the applications size by the name in the list would be a good idea? after all, this is supposed to be portable apps for a USB key. It would make it more relevent to users with a 128mb USB key.
FAT is commonly used to transport portable files. But VFAT LFN support in Windows NT and later versions has a new "feature" that breaks backwards compatibility with all previous OS, such as 98. Sometimes there is a long filename and a 8.3 shortname. Sometimes there is just an ordinary shortname. But sometimes there is a modified shortname, with two hidden bits that encode whether the filename is lowercase. The older versions of Windows do not understand these hidden bits. They treat the filename as all uppercase, so some filenames may change when reading the files on Windows 98. Often this filename change, from "example" to "EXAMPLE", does not matter, because Windows is mostly case-insensitive. But sometimes it causes software to malfunction, in strange ways. This happens with Portable ClamWin and Portable Nvu. The only ways around the problem are to transfer the files in an archive, to move them over a network, or to use Linux to read and re-write the files with the shortname mount option turned off. 69.87.193.141 22:40, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
This could do with a new title. A question as a title makes it sound like a discussion question rather than an encyclopaedia entry. Just can't think of one myself Aldaden 03:55, 7 July 2007 (UTC)
For many years, getting Microsoft's "Certified for Microsoft Windows" logo required that an application store all its configuration data in registry entries, rather than in separate configuration files. Failing to abide meant no logo. This made it impossible to get a small-footprint app certified, since even giving the user the OPTION of bypassing the registry lost one's certification. Microsoft may have finally relaxed that unpopular and annoying requirement; can anybody confirm this? A recent edit doubted that this policy even seemed plausible; but it was long a bone of contention among independent software developers, who didn't like being forced to rely on the registry, especially in its buggy early days. Getting Microsoft's seal of approval was a necessity, so we had to bite the bullet. I don't see any mention of this requirement in the current "Certified for Microsoft Windows Vista" documents; but I'm not currently trying to code to that standard, and I may not be delving deeply enough in the rule book. Trevor Hanson 06:27, 16 July 2007 (UTC)
Comment about sentence in this article: "It is unclear whether a general solution is or will be available for making a third-party vendor's software portable."
Would the category 'Portable Workspaces' in the Wikipedia article about 'Virtualization' be considered a 'general solution'?
Shouldn't this section just be removed? AFAICS, it's just spambait? Nuwewsco (talk) 18:38, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
Are they all the same? Or totally different? Is there any definition for these stuff can be found as source of reference? Stewart~惡龍 23:37, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
It might be good to write something to distinguish this concept from the (older) concept of software portability. —Fleminra (talk) 17:58, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
The section about portable apps on Linux could use some work... can anyone improve it? I would If I had more knowledge... I have found very few references regarding that on the net. The most complete page I found is: http://hacktolive.org/wiki/Portable_Applications_(Linux) but it is not much... SF007 (talk) 18:46, 17 November 2008 (UTC)
Please use comparison tables from independent reviewers. Don't source stuff from comparison tables that are made by one of the companies being compared. All such tables are tweaked to make their own product look better, and can't be trusted as sources. Also, it's spammish, so get a table from an independient reviewer who doesn't have a conflict of interest in making one of the products look better. --Enric Naval (talk) 20:20, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
"Portableapps" links to this article while "PortableApps" links to PortableApps.com. Shouldn't the alternate capitalization also link to the other article? I don't think people would use "portableapps" to search for the general concept of portable applications. It's a brand name. 94.222.99.19 (talk) 14:13, 15 February 2014 (UTC)
The current definition of a portable as is not clear enough or accurate enough. The article intro currently reads:
"A portable application (portable app), sometimes also called standalone, is a program designed to read and write its configuration settings into an accessible folder in the computer, usually the folder where the portable application can be found. This makes it easier to transfer the program with the user's preferences and data between different computers. A program that doesn't have any configuration options is also a portable application."
This does not quite comport to the definition of a portable as I have always understood it and as I have seen used elsewhere on the internet. Here is a summarized version of the definition of a portable application from whatis.com [1]:
"A portable application (portable app) is a software product designed to be easily moved from one computing environment to another...Portable apps are usually stored on USB drives but can be stored on some other flash media...portable apps can be used on any compatible device, wherever the user is...A portable app is not installed and as a rule, does not put associated files and configuration information on the host device but stores all application files and data together. Because files and data are self-contained, portable apps run independently of the host operating system (OS)."
The key requirements to be a portable app based on the most common definition are:
Now where things get tricky is whether certain cloud based on count as portable apps. Apps that run completely via a website generally don't count as portable is this sense. But what about apps that download app binaries to your machine to be able to run but are not installed permanently in the usual app instillation way? For example. do Progressive Web Apps also qualify as portable apps too?
If no one objects to the definition of a "portable application" I have laid out above, then I would be happy to try and fix the intro and ports of the main text to better describe portable apps. --2600:1700:56A0:4680:BC96:8641:D88A:8194 (talk) 17:26, 15 April 2018 (UTC)
Who came up with the idea of that photo? Portability does not mean that you carry your application in your shirt pocket. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.2.86.254 (talk) 15:26, 29 June 2018 (UTC)