>>109682210
Depends on the program.

>>109682210
Almost always portable.

>>109682210
source.tar.gz

Everything should be portable, no usecase storing shit outside of the program directory

>>109682257
This

>>109682257
Can still be either installed or kept portable in most cases though.

>>109682257
/thread

just build from source kike

>>109682210
If it doesn't need deeper system integration, it doesn't need to be an installer. End of story.
Most "installers" just drop it in a folder anyway, but take advantage of elevated privileges to litter unnecessary crap across the system in the process. Crap which often isn't removed by the uninstaller, just as a final fuck you.
Portable and self contained is always preferable outside of that specific situation. Put it wherever the hell you want, even on a USB stick, and it just works.

>>109682990
build? what? retard making words up kek the absolute state of /g/
so where is the exe? i already downloaded source.tar.gz but double clicking main.c does nothing it just opens notepad

>>109682210
Portable. To begin with, 90% of installers only exist for creating start menu items and/or associating the program with some file extension, which only takes a couple of clicks to do manually.

>>109682210
Portable all the way, as much as I hate Apple, having everything in that in program in a self contained thing is the way to go.

"prefer". thats not about preferences. you simply cannot run mainstream programs without installation. the proper question is "why a binary cannot be unziped and run in general?"

this is obvious on GNUnix, because of inconsistencies - they force retards to create online "official" lists that are bound to a particular distro (or its deriviates), then, a separate installer program puts it in the system. the same installation paradigm.

portability requires a proper build/design of a program itself. it doesnt cancel installation lists, in fact it makes it easier for "installer" to put a program into system. some apps resist to portability deliberately, like Chrome. the resistance means distribution control. every installation corresponds to a certain user (machine ID, etc), so enables tracking, opens up other possibilities.

In the past on Windows I would use the portable version if available. The simple reason is that it's much easier to refresh or change machines that way without losing settings.
Since I moved to Linux I do not really care, settings are not getting lost now.

For personal stuff, portable every time.
But, installers are a must for corporate and business computers. It's just plain impossible to maintain things any other way. That's part of why so many things only come with installers.

>>109682210
portable. I dont want the installer to put shit in various places on my system and then not properly clean it all up when i uninstall

>>109682210
If a program will keep everything inside then portable. If it's going to shit my local user folders then i will just install through winget at least i can update from there.

>>109683264
Portable is great for cucked corporate envs that want admin password for everything.

>>109682210
Portable
Microsoft is trying to kill it though. It's pushing it's retarded msix and windows store bullshit really hard.

>>109682210
Portable
But I want the OS to still manage it so it shows up in the Start menu, for all users, uninstall, etc.
So, installer actually I guess.

>>109682210
Most "portable" programs end up sharting all over AppData + Local + My Documents

>>109683943
>option 1
>wait no actually option 2
Schizophrenia

>>109683954
Kek

>>109683946
User config, program state and logs should all be stored on the machine in a user controlled and user writable directory ($env:USERPROFILE/AppData) by default. However the locations of each should be configurable in the program settings so a user can opt-in to storing that stuff directly alongside the portable exe if they want.
The switch between portable and non-portable should be implicit by the presence of a hidden file named .portable created in the same directory as the executable itself.
The settings file should be .ini or .json so that it is trivially modifiable in default powershell with no external modules required. If your program needs complex settings or re-use you can use .yaml but that should be avoided.

 
Program/
  |- program.exe
  |- .portable
  |- settings.{ini,json}

>>109684082
I should also mention that a program should never, ever store State and Config in the same file.
A program should respect that the user might be tracking their config in a source-control repository, and with that in mind a program should never automatically write new content to a users config file. Things like "last window position" should never be stored in a config file, because it is relevant on only one machine for one session and cannot be synchronized between machines.

>>109684125
i see you hate windows as much as i do

>>109684394
No, I really like Windows.
I like that it's "installation" model is so flexible and can be made into something so elegant.
What I hate is program authors who don't put any thought into config, state and directory layouts.
Leaving a clean jobsite is part of doing a good job.

This isn't OS specific. Linux programs are notoriously bad for shitting all over your home directory and assuming that it's okay to just shit a .programrc file arbitrarily in your home dir. Recently (past 10years) more and more programs have started to at least respect XDG_CONFIG_DIR but they still don't respect the other XDG cars, so it's still a clusterfuck.

installer mostly
portable only if it's self contained to the directory the binary is in (doesn't plant appdata on C)

>>109684082
>$env:USERPROFILE/AppData

if a user unpacks an archive (anywhere) then it is already a writable place, so all other complication (rules you brought) can be skipped, those details are unimportant

>>109684436
>it's "installation" model is so flexible

installation paradigm is not flexible, you started by adding rules to the portable paradigm, because that is flexible. now apply them rules to winsxs/ directory - impossible, because it is not flexible, there are other rules.

--
binary pressure sourced from the "standard" will eventually make a distro fragile, like slackware - any update may become a conflict with any other binary stuff that is already sitting in the system (either "installed" or waiting). that is the result of the absense of strategic thought - there are too many combinations to reliably manage them.

portable is reachable with discipline, but you cannot generally impose it on everybody - another retard will start making his own distro/installer maze and it may become popular, so a technical solution is required. i think know it, it is a part of my "username", hehehe.

>>109682210
Why is portable not standard given you have to reinstall windows periodically

>>109682210
Whatever the fuck godot does
It's almost scary that they can do a single file for every OS and it just works

>>109684738
>single file for winblows
>gets detected as a virus by windows defendgoy 50% of the time
>now you need a shitty .pck file alongside your binary

File: Annotation 2026-04-18.png (19 KB, 514x349)

19 KB PNG

https://pixel<cut>drain.com/u/ddx4whTQ

run as administrator? - rejected !

>>109683192
Mac apps are not portable. They create config and temp files outside the app folder.

>>109686292
thats only because app developers choose to create those config/temp files there similar to what >>109684436 was saying

By the shit that people do at my work place when it comes to Window's registry, portable.

>>109686405
Yeah I know. There are actually some portable apps on Mac too, but the typical apps that you drag and drop in the App folder are not portable.
'No installer' is not the same as 'Portable'.

>>109686405
>>109686430
Yes, rest assured any .app you drag in there is shitting all over your library

>>109686430
i was under the impression that those apps stored inside an .dmg were basically equivalent on windows to a .zip that contains a folder (that hold the executable + data) and a shortcut to where programs are commonly stored?
it's just that because nobody has decided to standardise (and enforce) where program file data should be stored we're in this mess

>>109682210
If I use it once in a blue moon, or just trying it first time, portable.
If I deem it worthy to keep, then I get the installer.

>>109682210
Both are garbage. I hate how Windows handles program installation.
If it's portable, then you have to create all shortcuts manually, associate all file extensions manually, and if it's time to uninstall, revert all those manually.
If it's installed, then it leaves all kinds of garbage around that you need an external program to clean up.

>>109686483
A proper 'Portable' app stores config files (and other files it creates during usage) next to the executable. And it has to store them as _relative_ paths, so that you can copy the app folder to any location or to another computer, and have everything work the same.

Typical Mac apps that are extracted from a dmg image don't work that way. And many Windows apps that are extracted from a zip don't work that way either (even though some developers wrongly call them portable).

>>109686566
ah that makes sense, thank you for clarifying that for me anon

>>109682210
Docker container.

File: redditooo.png (135 KB, 474x532)

135 KB PNG

>>109686605
>I love spinning up VMS! I'm going to create a new CONTAIIIINER! I will ISOALTE my sandboxes. I will happily eat 4GBs of RAM for each.

>>109686613
This but unironically.

>>109682252
This. I actually can't think of a reason to prefer the installer.

File: 1764847044415138.png (1001 KB, 1019x620)

1001 KB PNG

>>109682210
Portable. One of linux's greatest philosophical demands is that everything is treated as a file/path. None of the nigger windows "registry" or "user directory" bullshit where you have to check 3-4 different locations for an obscure setting indian microsoft devs\tech support want you to pay $500 a month to know about through Good Goy Indian Microslop Service Package™. "Reboot your PC" recommended on forums ->
>no ranjesh, I actually had to go into HKLM\Microshart\Windows\Application Experience\10\Native\ and make a custom dword with a special value. kys

if you are in tech you know indian walling of technical capability is one of their primary weapons, the registry was the shot across the bow

>>109682210
Cloud services are portable. You will own nothing.

>>109686613
I say this

>>109682210
Depends. I hate how there is no proper way for the OS to index portable programs

>>109687343
>One of linux's greatest philosophical demands
The irony being that 90% of software installed on Linux is a dynamically linked mess that gets installed arbitrarily into a system location alongside hundreds of other binaries and shared libraries that are versioned by creating a bunch of symlinks.

>>109688200
if you decompress a .tar.gz with gzip you end up with a .tar, so .tar.gz is perfectly correct.