Portable applications are nice, simple programs that do not need to be installed on each and every computer that you are using.
Some software installers don't seem to do much except verify the environment and copy files to your hard drive. What I would like is my installed Windows apps on an external hard drive (or USB device) that can be carried around between computers. Settings and data should also be stored on the external hard drive so application changes (or game progress) can be preserved across computers.
Now, many Windows applications use the "AppData\Roaming" directory for certain settings and user data. This location seems to be stored in an environment variable. Is there a way to temporarily override the USERPROFILE
or APPDATA
location for just one application? This would be ideal, so that settings and data could be written to one location, instead of being copied between the external hard drive and host computer.
This goes beyond the idea of PortableApps(tm). I do not want to package applications or install some ridiculous runtime. Something nice and simple is all I'm looking for.
Any proposed solution must not cause any interference with other applications.