Portable software is a class of software that is suitable for use on portable drives such as a USB (thumb) drive or digital audio player or PDA with "drive mode", although any external hard drive can be used.[1][2] The concept of carrying one's favored applications, utilities, and files on a portable drive for use on any computer is one which has evolved considerably in recent years.
Programs in this category (also known as portable applications) are typically 'lite' versions of their parent software, but there are many exceptions.
To be considered portable, for purpose of this list, a computer program must:
Not require any kind of formal installation onto a computer's permanent storage device to be executed, and can be stored on a removable storage device such as USB flash drive, enabling it to be used on multiple computers.
Settings are stored with, and can be carried around with, the software (i.e., they are written to the USB drive). If the registry is used to store settings, the application's configuration isn't portable, and must be set up on every PC it is used on
Leaves a zero (or near-zero) "footprint" on any PC it is run on after being used. i.e., All temporary files/registry settings should be removed once the program has exited, and files created by the user can be saved directly to the same removable media as the application is stored on.
Generally, smaller utility/toolkit software is inherently fairly portable; though larger applications are sometimes changed in order to allow a portable versions to be released (e.g., Opera@USB and OperaTor).
Metapad – for portability in version 3.6 onwards, at first run use the /m switch or create a blank text file called metapad.ini in the same directory as the executable.
mIRCNote: There is a U3 version of mIRC that can be installed on U3 drives. The original application is portable, leaving behind only the license key in the registry. (This may not be true with the newer versions that are vista-compatible, as their default user data area was changed to the user's application data folder.) Since v3.1, it can be started from a command line using the -portable switch to use settings, DLLs, and license keys that are stored in the same folder as mirc.exe.
WinRAR, Portable version for Windows, still requires having a license for a regular version of WinRAR. The version number for WinRAR Unplugged is 3.8.0.1, while the latest WinRAR for Windows version is 4.11
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