Many software programs have a portable version of their applications that can be installed on a portable flash drive. This version of the programs is more condensed so they can be run right from the flash drive. This makes it convenient to take your favorite programs with you from home to school, work or to use on any public computers. Certain portable program installation requires that you have a portable platform installed on your flash drive before installing the program. Other programs allow you to install the program right on the flash drive.

Instructions

1.Install programs through a portable platform. Such platforms (PortableApps, U3 or Creedo) have personalized installation files. You will have to install the platforms on the flash drive first. Download the platform from the Internet (see Resource section for some links), double-click on the installation file and follow the wizard to install the platform on the flash drive. You will then have to download the portable installation file for the software programs that you want to install on the flash drive. Download links for the installations files of the portable versions can usually be found on the website of the software developer or on the website for the portable platform.


Initiate the platform by inserting the flash drive in your USB port on your computer. The platform usually loads automatically; if it doesn’t, go to “My Computer” and double-click on the drive that is associated with the flash drive. Once the platform has been initiated you can install the other software programs to the flash drive using the menu option of the platform. For instance, with PortableApps, you will click on “Options > Install Apps.” Each platform has its own menu item that you can click on to install a new application. A wizard will take you through the steps to complete the install.

2.Install the program right to the flash drive without a platform. For small software programs that don’t require the use of the registry, choose the flash drive as the destination for the program’s folder when going through the installation wizard. Usually the installation process chooses to create a folder on the C: drive to install the program. During this step, click the browse button instead and choose the flash drive to install the program. You need to make sure that you have enough room on the flash drive to hold the program before doing this.


3.Install the program to the hard drive and then copy over the programs containing the folder to the flash drive. This is another option to have programs installed on a flash drive. Once again, this has to be a program that doesn’t require use of the Window’s registry, meaning that you don’t have to register or activate it before it will work. Go to where the folder is currently housed (usually in the “C:/Program Files/” folder), right-click on the folder and then click on copy. Go to the flash drive, right-click inside of the drive’s folder and click paste. The entire folder for the program will copy over and you can run the program from the flash drive.