-=PCTechTalk=- Re: Good Sync

  • From: EddieB <fasteddieb216@xxxxxxxxx>
  • To: <pctechtalk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Wed, 5 Aug 2009 23:31:55 -0400

Don,

The type of portable app you are referring to is usually built from the
ground up to be portable from the software maker.  I am under the impression
that even many of those (designed to be portable) apps still use the
registry, but are designed to create any missing registry entries on
startup, instead of reporting errors for needed entries.

Here are a few links with more info on using loaders to make an app
portable:
http://portableapps.com/development
http://www.systemsaflame.in/portapps/apploader.aspx
http://www.portablefreeware.com/forums/viewforum.php?f=16

The $6,000 VMware ThinApp is the bulk corporate license, where I'm pretty
sure the non-corporate single-user license starts at $47.  Go to the
following link, click "Buy Now", then click the "ThinApp 4 client license"
tab:
http://www.vmware.com/products/thinapp/howtobuy.html

BTW, the "virtual machine of sorts" you referred to is what I called
"sandbox".  I don't agree with your phrase "environment totally isolated
from the workstation".  ThinApp lets you totally customize the amount of
isolation it uses.  I forget the details since I only played around with the
trial version for a week or so, but I believe there are 3 options (something
like 1=access sandbox only; 2=access real system only; 3=access item in
sandbox if it exists there, otherwise access real system) which you can set
one as default and specify folders (or registry keys) to use other options.
Some apps work fine being "totally isolated" in the sandbox, but apps like
disk utils that need to make changes to the filesystem will have to get
access to the real system.  Most apps could work correctly with the registry
totally isolated, but definitely not all.

Also, when you setup a ThinApp app, you can have several programs in that
one ThinApp, but tell ThinApp to create shortcuts to the extra programs.
Basically, ThinApp puts everything into the main .exe and the shortcuts you
specify are actually very small .exe loader's that tell ThinApp where in the
main .exe file the other programs are.  Because of this you can't rename the
main .exe after it has been created by ThinApp if you are using shortcuts to
other programs inside that ThinApp application.  I'm a bit tired, so I'm not
sure if I explained that in a way anyone other than me can understand.  lol

Ed

-----Original Message-----
From: pctechtalk-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:pctechtalk-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of
recklessmaverick@xxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Wednesday, August 05, 2009 9:29 AM
To: pctechtalk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: -=PCTechTalk=- Re: Good Sync

On your first point, can you point me to a website that explains this 
process?  I am under the impression that each portable app uses INI 
files and hard coding instead of entries in the registry.  They also use 
relative rather than absolute paths so the app can find whatever it 
needs.  I am anxious to learn about this "loader" tool.

If I understand correctly, the VMware product installs a normal software 
product like MS Office into a virtual machine of sorts that keeps it 
isolated from the workstation hardware and software.  This is designed 
to facilitate software distribution and deployment.  The desired 
software is wrapped up into an EXE file that will open the software in 
an environment totally isolated from the workstation.  I would think you 
would wrap only one program up in one EXE file since I saw no mention of 
a menu system that would let you select which program to launch.  The 
price of this VMware product starts at over $6000. 
Don



EddieB wrote:
> I agree.  Most of the portable apps out there use a loader, which
basically
> means a program that writes to the registry all the things the app needs
> before loading the app, and then removing the registry entries and other
> cleanup duties after the app closes.  Some are pretty good at doing that,
> but I would think that few are perfect and some are pretty bad.  One major
> worry is how the loader handles your PC crashing before it can clean up.
>
> The other popular way to make a portable app is by using a program called
> ThinApp by VMware.  It basically wraps the app in a sandbox which has its
> pros and cons.  If setup right, the sandbox gives an added level of
security
> against an app going awry and causing problems on the system.  The problem
> is that you take a slight performance hit (which is less of an issue every
> year) and the sandbox causes compatibility issues with certain types of
> apps.  Now the setting up of a ThinApp program is very critical.  When
> creating the ThinApp you can specify which parts of the registry and
> harddrive the app reads/writes to the sandbox or the real system.
>
> Ed
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: pctechtalk-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> [mailto:pctechtalk-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Gman
> Sent: Tuesday, August 04, 2009 5:39 PM
> To: pctechtalk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: -=PCTechTalk=- Re: Good Sync
>
> There are portable apps that are not as postable as you might believe.  A 
> simple test would be to first run it in a sandbox app like Sandboxie to
make
>
> sure it's not adding files anywhere else.
>
> Peace,
> Gman
>
>   
>
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