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And to get multiple Firefox versions you have to do a bit of user profile dickery

Or you use the "portable" versions, designed to be installed to removable media, that do this dickery for you.

Your description suggests that you have been bitten by "U3". It is, indeed, a thoroughly vile technology, of which Sandisk(among others) is inordinately fond. It essentially does nothing that http://portableapps.com/ can't; but with infinitely more suck.

After sufficient user outcry they, at long last, provided a (proprietary, Windows only) uninstaller for this "valuable feature". I'd still encourage you to punish Sandisk for their sins by withholding future purchases; but the uninstaller should at least make the stuff you already own suck a little less.

I've used x48 on Solaris and HPUX on many occasions, however I've found it to be somewhat unstable on recent linux releases (I suspect it's the GUI code, not the emulator itself). In any event I've found a more portable solution (aside from my actual HP50G). Emu48 skinned and running the roms for a HP50G makes for a very nice Win32 desktop calc (all the necessary bits are here, here, here, and refer to this first).

Simply placed on a USB drive the Emu48 install becomes portable. With a PortableApps install, and with a small bit of config editing on the PA side, the Emu48 directory can be dropped into the PortableApps directory and will integrate into the PA menu. Configured like that, you get portable, nice startup/shutdown, and it retains its memory between machines.

The portable version of Firefox 3.6 from PortableApps.com was just released in 15 languages, too:

http://portableapps.com/news/2010-01-21_-_firefox_portable_3.6

Use Portable PuTTY on a USB stick or a CD ?

If you need to have an updated version (or install extensions, etc.), use the portable version. It's meant to be installed to USB, but it works just fine from a local drive.

http://portableapps.com/apps/internet/firefox_portable

I would love a good alternative personally. All my users do is read the PDFs and we use PDFCreator for merging documents.

Free and you don't even need to install them. Just unpack in a directory:

Foxit Reader Portable

Sumatra PDF Portable

For merge/split: PDFTK Builder Portable

I would love a good alternative personally. All my users do is read the PDFs and we use PDFCreator for merging documents.

Free and you don't even need to install them. Just unpack in a directory:

Foxit Reader Portable

Sumatra PDF Portable

For merge/split: PDFTK Builder Portable

I would love a good alternative personally. All my users do is read the PDFs and we use PDFCreator for merging documents.

Free and you don't even need to install them. Just unpack in a directory:

Foxit Reader Portable

Sumatra PDF Portable

For merge/split: PDFTK Builder Portable

I will see your link and raise you the rest of the Portable Suite
http://portableapps.com/suite

http://portableapps.com/apps/office/openoffice_portable

Thanks to products like VMware, Virtual Box and Boot Camp, Mac and Linux users can be just as vulnerable as Windows users to viruses, bots and malware. Even though it's in its own virtual environment, if you have something like FUSE running within it to make your host filesystems available, anything infecting the guest OS can access files on the host. Make sure the VM software runs as a non-privileged user to mitigate these problems.

If you're on an IT managed PC at work, where you're not allowed to install software, get a thumb drive, go to PortableApps.com, download Firefox Portable Edition or Google Chrome Portable, install it (not in the Windows Installer sense) to your thumb drive and use it for web browsing on the Internet. Only use IE for web browsing on your corporate intranet or if you really, really, really, really, really have to for a site on the Internet that you trust.

..mm.. I've been using Keepass for a couple of years,http://keepass.info/ ..mm.. it's a small standalone program that'll run as a Portable App http://portableapps.com/ on a Flash/USB stick drive or on your hard drive it's Password protected and Free to use.. I find the database easy and useful and you only have to remember 1 password to let you in - all your passwords in one place.. No doubt there are some clever hackers out there who would delight in trying to crack the opening password.. but I'm not Paranoid..are you?

I've been using KeePass for years, and recently started using the portable version coupled with DropBox - viola, access to my passwords from anywhere, all nice and synchronized up! On my own PCs I have the DropBox client running all the time, and if I'm elsewhere and can't get a remote connection to my home PC, I can temporary download my files from the DropBox website without needing the client.

Another vote for keepass, but this time on a USB stick with Portable Apps-
http://portableapps.com/

Hello! The guy is on a corporate intranet where the PCs are locked down. So Irfanview portable or Paint.NET portable on a flash drive FTW, thank you very much.

Try pdftk for that protected PDF problem. It should strip the password protection in a lossless way plus has other features like splitting and merging.
GUI, Portable version

Well, I certainly remember it well and fire it up from time to time. It was what I used before Firefox and Thunderbird came along. Now that 2.0 has gone gold, hopefully some new users will find it and be intrigued.

As we (at PortableApps.com) do with Firefox, Thunderbird and Sunbird, we've packaged it as a portable app so you can use it on your flash drive/portable hard drive or try it out without installing it locally. 10 languages are available.

SeaMonkey, Portable Edition 2.0 at PortableApps.com

Let your old pal hairyfeet help you with that. The portable Firefox tweaks should get you MUCH better performance by cutting down on the SSD writes.

I would assume the only people who use IE on this site are forced to by a workplace where they don't have admin

That is no excuse; for those of you who are feeling oppressed try http://www.portableapps.com/.*

They are so beautiful, I'm thinking of making this the default way to set up a system with useable software. Love portableapps.com.

* Okay, yes there are some places where even portableapps aren't possible. Most will work though.

I was wondering the same, and wish you had been answered by someone not trying to be a comedic assclown.
I would think this possible, but not have went past installing Firefox Portable on my U3 Sandisk 4GB USB drive, and using that at work.(WinXP/IE7 environment)

I would love to be able to go in to work, plug my USB drive into the PC, and have U3 load Kubuntu 9.04 with my current pref's and config's from home...even if I had to reboot Windows.

Instead of 'RTFM-n00bs' flames, give up some FOSS love and goodness for your future generations, Peace!

Agreed. I use Firefox for ordinary browsing and Firefox Portable http://portableapps.com/apps/internet/firefox_portable/ for any browsing that I may not want others to come across. Sometimes, I use the Distrust add-on https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1559/ for Firefox if I just want to hide a single page.

Thunderbird with Lighting extension? It isn't pretty, but it is effective, for me at least. And I do work in a corporate environment exclusively Outlook/Exchange. (there might needs be a calendar/task_manager extension, it's been a while since I set it up.)
Here is the portable version that I use.

She can always use Portable Skype in her Notebook.
As long as her internet connection isn't filtered she won't get in trouble.

http://portableapps.com/node/246

Acrobat is like a giant virus on every machine I've run it on.

SumatraPDF is much, much faster and better.

Besides Adobe is a Fox news sponsor. Don't give them your money or your ram!!!

http://portableapps.com/de/apps/office/sumatra_pdf_portable

"Here's an idea - how about Linux developers just write some useable apps that people actually want"

Firefox, Thunderbird, Filezilla, VLC media Player, Coolplayer ..

PortableApps.com

Amusing post.

Things are changing pretty rapidly now. Please try to keep up.

Most high school students interested in science or engineering careers learn a bit of some programming language in the same way they learn a bit about sex: from each other, Typically in a guy's basement on his family's old Win98 or WinXP computer, rather than in the back seat of Mom's car... but the kind of fooling around is the similar.

The scripting languages are easy to come by. Firefox with Firebug and a foss text editor like Notepad++ make an excellent Javascript development environment. Heck, for the cost of a dozen good condoms and a visit to Portable Apps a geek-thinking high schooler can put an entire development package, complete with web server and database, on a 2 GB stick and have huge amounts of room for code monkey play. How could any kid interested in science or engineering resist this? And it is SO much easier than finding someone who would be interested in exploring the intended use of the condoms...

So no, I'm pretty sure parent post is wrong. That is, I doubt very much that most of the college freshmen in any of the technical schools today are programming virgins. The majority of high school students may still be virgins wrt programming experience... but those are not the ones who apply to, and get accepted into, technical schools.

The answer remains: fuck ye!

Administrator's response: Fuck executables outside %SystemRoot% and %ProgramFiles%.

The excuse: "I can download a web browser for free, but I can't install it because I'm not in the Administrators group."

The answer remains: fuck ye!

First of all, it's Firefox, not "FireFox". Do you just assume it's spelled that way because you don't care enough to check? Second, there are portable versions of many real browsers, such as Firefox Portable. It does not require administrative privileges to run, so you can use it any where, even at work. So, no more excuses for browsing Slashdot with IE6. Got it?

Have a clean install on your laptop and then use portable apps http://portableapps.com/ for anything personal.
Use encrypted filesystems for personal data.

No matter how you look at it; a laptop is portable and can easily be stolen. The question is not whether you'll let others use it from time to time, but how you personal stuff is protected in case it gets 'misplaced'. If you are prepared for theft, making that friendly gesture to a co-student won't bothr you a bit. At least security-wise.

MicroXP as an OS. Blazingly fast, runs on old hardware, is backwards compatible with 99% of your current application needs.

Then replace all your applications with:
http://portableapps.com/apps/office/openoffice_portable
and the like.

Then as you weed out the last apps that require Windows, switch to Linux Mint, and never pay for software or get locked into a corporations dying gasps ever again.

Windows 7 may be a service pack for Vista, but what Vista SHOULD BE is an improvement in stability, speed, efficiency and features to XP. It is none of that. It is inferior to XP on every level, save eye candy, where it is solidly beat across the board by Linux and Mac anyway.

Windows 7 should die, just like Vista is dying. I refuse to use either and only use XP or Linux Mint.

There isn't one good reason to use anything else. Macs cost way too much fucking money, and every other version of Windows is inferior.

In particular I use MicroXP quite a bit. Search for it on btjunkie.org. I have a valid XP license, but I prefer the smaller foot print and faster speed of MicroXP hands down, for everything but Microsoft Office, which I don't use anyway:
http://portableapps.com/apps/office/openoffice_portable

Seriously, if you think there is anything capable of being connected to the Internet that "cannot" be used for any of this nefarious crap, you're either seriously delusional, or woefully uneducated in security

Run the device from a read-only device and flush all the detritus from the cache at shutdown. Have the base system run the screen, mouse and keyboard and run the rest from a U3 type device. I'm using something similar, a bunch of portable apps on a USB stick.

Sumatra PDF is also available in a portable format.

Let's hope they fix the bug in the Program Compatibility Assistance that installers that don't affect certain registry keys in add/remove to have an error. It basically kills off lots of updaters, plugin installers and PortableApps.com Installers:
http://portableapps.com/node/18540

Is this version of portable chrome legimite. I do know it tries to go online and write to my system, strange for a portable app ...

I have had 2 fail on me within the last year. The first was a Corsair Survivor http://www.corsair.com/products/survivor/default.aspx Was a pretty rough and tumble device but I guess it couldn't stand pottery dust. Within 4-5 months Windows nor Mac would recognize the drive. I kept a backup of it and called Corsair. They were very cool about it and asked that I return it. I sent it back and received a replacement for the drive within a few business days of them receiving it. I want to say that it was sent back to me via UPS Second Day. The drive itself wasn't handled to roughly so I have my doubts that it wasn't just a hardware problem from the start. Second one that is on its' way to failing is an Imation Clip Drive http://www.imation.com/en/Imation-Products/USB-Flash-Drives--Accessories/Clip-Flash-Drive/. It is intermitantly failing to transfer files. I ran a version of Portable Apps http://portableapps.com/ and am also starting to see the Imation have a few problems. I'll probably not get the clip flash again because dust and dirt gets into the rubber boot and falls into the USB sheeth.
I work in an environment that can get pretty dirty, http://www.hlchina.com/ But what should I expect from a pottery. On the positive side, i've had about 3-4 SD cards that I transfered over from my Palm Zire that are now being used in the wife's camera and they refuse to die.

Not to mention as a PC repairman it has really helped me move folks away from the ubercrap that is IE. I would get a call to go out and fix a home user/SOHO/small business and I always carry my flash with me loaded with computer repair utility toolkit and portable Firefox with Adblock Plus installed. It never seems to fail that I have this conversation:

"Hey, how come I don't see that stupid 'hit the clown and win an iPod ad'?" that is because with Firefox 3 and Adblock Plus I don't have to look at stupid ads anymore. Makes my day nicer and my browser load quicker to boot. "I bet that is expensive and really hard to set up,huh?" Nope, it is absolutely free, no adware or spyware either, and with Adblock Plus I answer a single question and I'm done. It even updates itself so as new ads or Internet bugs come along I don't have to worry. "Uuuhh, since you are here anyway, do you think you could install that to MY machine?"

I can't count how many times I have had that conversation. I even managed to get my Luddite 67 year old dad to get off IE. Trying to sell folks security is like trying to sell them air. They know they need it but actually getting them to grasp it is NOT easy. Thanks to Adblock Plus getting them switched to a more secure browser is simple as 1-2-3. 1-Let them see me using FF3 with Adblock Plus. 2-Tell them it is free and easy when asked 3-Install FF3 and Adblock Plus when requested by the user(which they always do). So my heart goes out to their family. Guys like Rick have done more to spread FOSS than any bullet pointed list about security ever could. Thanks to Adblock Plus the web is what I WANT it to be, not what some damned irritating advertiser makes it into. He really was one of the unsung heroes of FOSS because by maintaining the Adblock Plus list he made FF3 an easy sell to every IE user I've come in contact with.

And for those that suggested a HOSTS file, aka the Cheap Opera hack? That is NOT easy, in fact for the average home user maintaining a HOSTS file is strange and difficult. With FF3 and Adblock Plus they don't have to do ANYTHING, as the software does it all for them. Can't get much simpler than that.

Might I recommend Firefox Portable for such people? It's a bloody godsend.

I already subscribe to the Portable Freeware Collection newsletter. Another good resource is Portable Apps. They offer lots of open source programs via SourecForge. The Foxmarks plug-in for FF is good for updating bookmarks too.

Portable Firefox works on my locked down WinXP corp PC.

Badly done lockdown. Active Directory allows disabling every executable not on specific paths. Heck, it even allows you to run only selected ones and only when hashes match.

Portable Firefox works on my locked down WinXP corp PC.

As always, you can try it out by downloading the portable version - Mozilla Firefox, Portable Edition - from PortableApps.com. It won't affect your local 3.0.7 install, so you can try out the features of the new beta without worrying about it affecting your extensions or settings.

http://portableapps.com/news/2009-03-12_-_firefox_portable_3.1_beta_3

Try these programs which work from a USB drive: http://portableapps.com/ http://www.pendriveapps.com/

Yes, I see much the same. I have ~30 extensions, and currently five tabs open, been running all day, and only ~160MB in use.

But I don't think the people that are complaining about this are making it up, so the question is, what is going wrong for them? On Windows I recommend trying Firefox Portable as a diagnostic aid (make sure you close your installed Firefox before running the portable version). That will run with it's own profile and extensions all in it's own directory, completely separate from your installed version, so if you don't see the same problems then you know your problem is down to a broken Firefox install, try a full uninstall, manually delete the ff program folder and wipe your profile before reinstalling.

With Firefox Portable Of course!

"ANY corporate non-techie is going to see that if they have to boot Windows to get their big tasks done they obviously don't want Linux on their main system"

"heavier duty" computing like running Microsoft Office applications"

Would Portable Office (86.4MB) run on such a system?

This is a better tool for making screen images and it is easier to use than MS Paint:

http://portableapps.com/apps/utilities/lightscreen_portable

"Beyond file associations, I doubt it uses any. Everything is stored in its preference system, which is stored in prefs.js"

Not even that, with the Portable Apps version ..