A portable app is an application that is packaged to work from USB-sticks (Thumb drives). The main goal is to make it works on multiple-system and keep it private locked with data within the thumb-drive. Portable apps are often a one-file app that does not require installation and it's easy to place it on portable media If the app is moved or placed to another folder it will work the same way So the user can carry them around from computer to computer.
Portable apps are easy to install, manage and take within the pocket everywhere, and they easily run on any windows machine. The major benefit of using the portable app is it keeps its settings across many computers, and run smoothly on multiple system versions, and of course, there is no need to install and configure programs every-time we need to use them on another machine.
Portable apps have many advantages but they have many disadvantages as well like they don't work well for multiple users, they require careful USB-media (USB-drive) eject method to not corrupt the portable app's files, and sometimes they run slower on portable media considering the file size and the operation performed.
There are hundreds of Windows portable apps, However, as we are open source supporters we will point out to open source
ThumbApps is an open source (FOSS/ Freeware) portable apps portal (directory), It focuses on open source applications to provide the user with more freedom, They port, test and package the app for portable usage.
Some useful apps listed in ThumbApps directory
Security
- BitVise SSH client
- Wireshap network tool
- Advanced IP Scanner
- Fiddler Portable Web Debugger
- OpenVPN
- Zemana AntiMalware
- Password Recovery Bundle Portable Professional
- Comodo Cleaning Essentials/CCE (Antivirus)
Office
- WPS Office Portable (WPS office suite portable)
- ResophNotes Portable
- Knowte Portable (text editor)
- Rainlendar Portable
- Atomic Wallet Portable (Bitcoin Wallet)
- Calibre Portable (PDF and Document management app)
- HomeBank Portable (Personal Finance Manager)
- Not Another PDF Scanner
- PDF Split and Merge Basic
- QOwnNotes Portable (An amazing not taking app we have featured it here)
- PDF-XChange Editor Portable
- VivPDF Editor Portable
- PDF Compressor Pro Portable
- WriteMonkey Portable (Full-screen writer-friendly text-editor)
- PDF Shaper Portable
Web (Internet)
- Firefox browser portable
- Waterfox browser portable edition
- Brave Privacy-first web browser portable
- WeChat portable
- Torrent clients (uTorrent, Transmission, BitTorrent, BitLord )
- RcloneBrowser Portable
- Cyberduck: a libre (Freeware/ Opensource) server and cloud storage browser for Mac and Windows
- Vivaldi Portable
- Opera browser portable
- Aurora Portable Browser (Lightweight web browser)
- Popcorn time portable
- FeedDemon (RSS/ Atom Feed Reader)
- Hootr Portable (Podcast download manager)
- Jitsi Portable ( Open source Chat/ messaging app)
- Foxmail Portable (Email client)
- Google Drive portable (Which allow sync the documents directly to the USB drive)
- Stremio Portable (Movie/ TV series streamer)
- Inky Portable
- Single app
- Rocket.Chat Portable
ThumbApps has provided every app listed with installation manual and proper configuration guided by pictures to make it easy for non-experienced users setup and use portable apps on USB-sticks, the developers also provided most of the apps in (32/64 bit), with few exceptions.
ThumbApps has a rich catalog, that contains several other categories (Design, Game, and Education) hundreds of applications, as the developer(s) are adding the application on regular basis, they also provided several written tutorials on porting windows application for portable usage.
Medical Apps!
Portable apps can be used by patients to keep their records or a copy of their records as PHR (Personal Health Records), However, there is no application listed yet there, though I believe it'll require extra security measures to lock the portable media.
Doctors tend to save sensitive records either patient-related or work-related, however all they can use there are several note-taking apps, but they still require taking extra steps to ensure security for the portable media and the records. There is no EMR (Electronic Medical Records) ported yet, Though it would be nice to see something like FreeMedForms ported and used as a portable app.