Perhaps the main downside to this approach is that it often involves time constraints. Library public computers often have rationed connect time; in my local library system it's 90 minutes per day, for example. At Fedex/Kinko's, of course, you're paying for connect time by the minute.
Open-source freeware portable applications are a relatively new technology, that I think in the real world pretty much trumps notebook/netbook computers, smartphones, tablets, U3, and everything else mobile. It's based on versions of popular open-source software, modified to run politely from a pocket USB flash drive, which becomes the only thing you need to carry with you.
You need USB 2.0 ports and a fast flash drive, or this will be painfully slow.
You have two menu/launcher choices in this system, the standard PortableApps one, and geek.menu with a lot more configuration options.
When you're using this system, on your own PC or a public one, you still have ready access to whatever software is available on the host computer, through the normal Windows Start menu and Desktop icons. At the same time, you have your own choice of portable apps on your external drive, from your menu/launcher, which opens from a tray icon, rather as if it were a second Start menu on the right-hand end of the Taskbar.
Portable apps are mostly run on USB flash-memory thumb drives, but you can use them on any relatively fast portable external media; including proprietary-format flash media and readers, such as Secure Digital and
SDHC; and large-capacity but compact external hard disk enclosures, for 2½-inch laptop-size hard disks, with USB or
eSATA interface. If you want your portable apps to run really fast, go with an external hard disk; it will be significantly faster than a flash drive even on USB 2.0. Flash drives can't use the full 480 Mbps potential of the USB 2.0 interface, topping out at 30-35 Mbps, because of limitations inherent in flash memory. If you have eSATA available where you use your external hard disk, that will be even faster, nominally 3 Gbps.
When you plug a USB drive into a public or loaner computer, if it has some front-panel USB ports that are part of the case and some on a drive-bay panel, use one on the case. They're more likely to be supported directly from the motherboard and therefore faster.
I think the only scenario where the portable flash drive alone might be insufficient is maybe business travel. You might want a slim notebook or netbook along, to have something to plug the USB drive into in the hotel room, and perhaps to use on the airplane. Probably you want to install Firefox and OpenOffice.org and so forth natively on the notebook for speed, and synchronize documents with the USB drive. Or you could simply work directly with the synchronized set of files on the USB drive; opening files through a USB port is relatively undemanding compared to launching applications from it. Bringing a netbook is also attractive for places like coffeehouses and bakeries with free WiFi but no loaner computers. For links about portable computers, see my
netbooks & notebooks page in this section.
- PortableApps.com home page
http://portableapps.com/
Wikipedia
- Motto: your digital life, anywhere.™
- PortableApps Suite & Platform
http://portableapps.com/suite
- Two turnkey Suite offerings of portable apps with launcher, or the Platform is just the launcher/menu module, and you separately download and install what you want. If you would prefer current versions of things, you should get just a menu package, either the PortableApps Platform or geek.menu below, and add individual portable apps to it. If you just want something that works and is quick to get, one of the Suite choices might meet your needs. The 113MB Suite Standard package includes OpenOffice.org Portable, by far the largest app in the suite. There's also a 35MB Suite Light version, that omits OpenOffice.org and substitutes
AbiWord Portable, a light-footprint word processor.
- geek.menu home page
http://geek-menu.sourceforge.net/
geek.menu project page
http://sourceforge.net/projects/geek-menu/
- If you find the default PortableApps menu/launcher widget too inflexible, as I did, you can use this
software fork instead. It has many more configuration options, and it's compatible with all the apps from PortableApps.com. Among other things, you can have geek.menu temporarily put up your own wallpaper, and it puts things back the way they were when it exits. You can install just geek.menu on your USB drive and add apps to it, or if you care to, you can keep both launchers installed and use either.
- Wikipedia:
Portable application
List of portable software
- Including references to other similar menu/launcher systems.
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- PortableApps applications page
http://portableapps.com/apps
- Many more apps than the ones I link here.
- Firefox Portable home page
http://portableapps.com/apps/internet/firefox_portable
Firefox Portable project page
http://sourceforge.net/projects/portablefirefox/
- The best Web browser. Many Firefox add-ins will work fine with Firefox Portable.
- Thunderbird Portable home page
http://portableapps.com/apps/internet/thunderbird_portable
Thunderbird Portable project page
http://sourceforge.net/projects/portabletbird/
- User-friendly POP-mail client that goes with Firefox. (I prefer Webmail, so I don't use this one.)
- OpenOffice.org Portable home page
http://portableapps.com/apps/office/openoffice_portable
OpenOffice.org Portable project page
http://sourceforge.net/projects/portableoo/
- Full-service free office suite, including spreadsheets, word processing, presentations.
- GIMP Portable home page
http://portableapps.com/apps/graphics_pictures/gimp_portable
GIMP Portable project page
http://sourceforge.net/projects/portablegimp/
- Graphics editing; the open-source answer to PhotoShop.
- Notepad++ Portable
http://portableapps.com/apps/development/notepadpp_portable
- A multi-document, syntax-highlighting code editor with lots of features and extensions, including an Explorer pane for opening files, and a Compare plug-in that's excellent for resolving conflicting edits. You can launch Notepad++ Portable (or any portable editor) from Firefox Portable, using the
ViewSourceWith Firefox add-on, unaffected by the changing drive letter on different computers, if you set up the editor-list item with a relative pathname.*
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If you're going to have duplicate sets of your document files on your home PC and on your PortableApps USB drive, you'll need a way to keep them synchronized. Sometimes files will be edited at home and sometimes portably. It's even possible to forget to sync when you should, and end up with conflicting edits.
- JFileSync home page
http://jfilesync.sourceforge.net/
Wikipedia
JFileSync project page
http://sourceforge.net/projects/jfilesync/
- An open-source Java-based cross-platform file synchronizer, with a simple elegant interface. In Automatic two-way sync mode JFileSync can even detect conflicting edits, because it keeps a database of what it saw last. JFileSync works in three steps: (1) you define a synchronization profile for a pair of directories; (2) you run a fast Compare step, it shows you what differences it found, and you can make adjustments, either to the sync profile or to proposed actions for particular files for the current sync; and (3) you run the sync process. JFileSync has modes for a two-way sync, appropriate for the PC-and-USB-drive situation where edits could happen on either device, and one-way modes for a simpler backup scenario. It can even synchronize directories over an Internet connection. It seems not to have been modified since 2007, but that may be because nobody thinks it needs any improvements. JFileSync is distributed as a simple zipfile with no installer, and on Windows you run it from an included batch file. File and folder exclusions in JFileSync have to be specified as regular expressions, sometimes called regex.*
- Unison
http://www.cis.upenn.edu/~bcpierce/unison/
Wikipedia
- There's really no reason your file sync program has to be a portable app. Open-source Unison runs cross platform including Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X, and it detects conflicting edits. Ubuntu supports Unison via its package manager, and unlike JFileSync it doesn't require a Java runtime. See also this
article on using Unison.
- Grsync
http://www.opbyte.it/grsync/
Wikipedia
- A Linux sync and backup alternative. Grsync is a GNOME graphical front-end for the Linux rsync copmmand-line utility, and it's in Ubuntu's package manager too. It's pretty good, but JFileSync and Unison are cross-platform.
- Wikipedia:
File synchronization
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File_synchronization
- Software and techniques for keeping multiple collections of the same files up-to-date. There's lots of open-source and proprietary software for this purpose.
A download manager on your portable drive can be worth having even on broadband. Free Download Manager can integrate with all the major browsers, but DownThemAll! as a Firefox extension is more tightly integrated and efficient. They both have lots of controls and great interfaces. For more on this subject see my
download managers page.
- DownThemAll (dTa) home page
http://www.downthemall.net/
Wikipedia
DownThemAll
add-on page https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/201
- A full-service multi-part resumable download manager in the form of a Firefox add-on, and it's compatible with Firefox Portable. Once you have its Manager window open, you can even close Firefox if you like. I used to use FDM, but I like this better now.
- Free Download Manager (FDM) home page
http://www.freedownloadmanager.org/
Wikipedia
Free Download Manager
project page http://sourceforge.net/projects/freedownload/
- FDM has a Create portable version option on its File menu, which installs it to run from a USB thumb drive or other external media. FDM has to be conventionally installed, at least temporarily, to do this. To get portable FDM to integrate with Firefox Portable, make sure you have FDM's own Firefox plug-in version 1.3.2 or later installed in Firefox Portable, filename fdm1.3.2.xpi, available
on Rapidshare as of March '09.
FDM's portable version as installed will have some extra EXE files in its main directory, but if you're using geek.menu rather than the PortableApps menu, you can hide the resulting unwanted menu items.
- WinWGet Portable home page
http://portableapps.com/apps/internet/winwget_portable
- Another DM compatible with Firefox Portable, this one maybe more for the true übergeek than for everybody. (This maybe logically belongs above with the other official PortableApps.com apps, but I wanted to list it here with the other DMs instead.)
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- PublicLibraries.com
http://www.publiclibraries.com/
- An index of public libraries by state. Librarians are smart, and they recognize that the Internet is everyone's primary library now. Public libraries usually offer free Internet access for cardholders, and often you can arrange free guest access while traveling. My local library system has fast broadband on PCs with front-panel USB ports, CD/DVD burners, laser printers, and Microsoft Office, and they'll even hand me a writeable CD for a dollar donation, or a small-capacity USB drive for about five bucks.
- Fedex Kinko's
http://www.fedex.com/us/office/
- These copy-center stores all over the US and some other countries have
self-service rental PCs with fast Internet access and lots of installed software, and of course many other services available there in the store. You can just walk in, sit down at a computer station, stick your card in a reader slot to log on, and you pay by the minute. You can use your own credit or debit card, including prepaid debit cards not connected to your accounts, or use an in-store kiosk to put cash into a free Kinko's smart card. They offer media-capable and basic workstations at different rates, and you may find that their computer rental rates vary from one metro area to another.
- U3 smart drive
system http://www.u3.com/
- Protocols and software for mobile computing that let you take your personal Windows PC environment with you on a USB thumb drive (address book, Web bookmarks, documents) and have it instantly available on other Windows PCs. Also supports proprietary flash media and other pocket devices based on flash memory. The idea here is the USB drive has just configuration, bookmarks, and document files, working with an assumed suite of apps (such as Office, IE, Outlook) that needs to be present on the host PC. See also the Wikipedia
U3 article which includes criticism.
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There are all kinds of USB flash-memory drives around. There's one called PopDrive that snaps into a bottle opener, presumably for the college set, and USB drives integrated into pens, watches, and a Swiss Army knife. There have been some efforts to make them look sort of like jewelry, with rather cheesy results so far. You can even get USB drives that look like sushi; don't ask me why.
There are significant differences in read/write speeds between different makes and models of USB drives, with read speeds mostly in the range of 15-35
Mbps. The free version of
HD Tune will give you an average read speed in Mbps, which should give you an idea how your drive is doing. Or you can try the DOS-prompt utility
chddspeed. The README file seems to be in Russian, but you can use syntax chddspeed x:\ including backslash, where x: is the drive you want to speed test, or if you omit the drive parameter it seems to default to the system's boot drive, typically the hard disk.
I was relieved that my
Sandisk Cruzer drive tested at 27.8 Mbps average read speed, not too shabby; I bought it long before I ever heard of portable apps. Cruzer drives have an outer case, black plastic by default, and the drive electronics, status LED, and USB plug are contained in a white translucent inner part, which slides/snaps to two positions within the outer case, with the USB plug either extended or retracted. There's no plug cover to lose. Sandisk drive models with Titanium in the name have a metal outer case rather than plastic, although I'm sure it's not really titanium. It looks like some models come with U3 smart drive software (which you can disable) and some don't. You don't need U3 software to use the type of portable apps I'm recommending here.
I haven't used one yet, but
OCZ's
ATV and
ATV Turbo rubber-armored shockproof and waterproof USB drives also seem to perform well in speed testing, and they also have status LEDs. They have a technically lose-able type of cap, but they come chained to a little plastic cap-keeper you can stick the cap on before you plug in the drive. They have a lifetime warranty, whatever that means. One review of the ATV drives I saw even had a picture of the guy's little dog holding the drive in his teeth.
If your top priority is portability and always having it with you, there are some extremely tiny
Intelligent Stick™ 2.0 ones from
PQI, with a simplified thin type of USB connector. Version 1.0 seemed to be just the thin "stick." I-Stick 2.0 comes with a protective credit-card size caddy that holds two sticks, and something they call a USB adapter that gives it a normal USB jack and some protection while it's plugged in. But you can still plug the bare stick into a USB port if need be. As of third quarter 2009
Cyberguys is selling what may be I-Stick 3.0, which seems to be designed to tag along with your car keys, although it doesn't seem to be on the PQI site yet.
Portable USB hubs usually have their ports crammed together tightly to minimize the size of the hub. Some USB devices, including memory card readers and some thumb drives, are wider next to the plug than many of these hubs will accomodate side-by-side. Some portable memory-card readers have their USB plug on a swivel, or with a built-in short "pigtail" cable. Cyberguys has one-foot and 7½-inch A male to A female USB cables that can be helpful with this issue, and also A male to B and mini-B male, handy for the upstream connection from the hub to the system when using a notebook or netbook. Cyberguys also offer what they call squid hubs, that have connectors on short lengths of cable instead of a solid body, which might solve the problem with one widget.
Flash media will wear out eventually; you may want to keep yours backed up. I copy mine to a folder on my hard disk occasionally.
How Long Does a Flash Drive Last? describes a 2008 test in which a Sony USB drive was deliberately driven to write failure. It took 90 million writes, and the drive contents could still be read, if not written. No guarantees it'll be that way when a drive of yours fails, of course. Some Linux distributions designed for netbooks use write caching to go easy on flash media.
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