Very nooby question...

[PotatoSandWitch]

Can I install an application on a CD or DVD so that I don't take up any space with it on my computer's hard drive?

And then can I run the app directly off it? Is this possible?

 

[Aluvus]

Some applications can be run from a USB thumb drive or similar. In general the fact that an application's installer cannot write to a CD or DVD is going to get in your way, except with programs that do not actually need an installer.

 

[stogez]

Not as far as I know. USB drives are a different story. You can install some programs on there. What app are you trying this for?

 

[MegaVovaN]

try these:
http://portableapps.com/

 

[PotatoSandWitch]

pinnacle studio 10... it's a video editing program that takes up a lot of space (and that I don't like very much - but it was only 20 bucks on sale).
I'm guessing there's no way it would be able to install on a CD/DVD... also guessing that for anybody who knows anything about this kind of thing, that would sound absurd 😱

 

[Nathelion]

There's always a way. It might end up requiring you to edit the binaries by hand though🙂 Seriously tho, if you got it to install to a folder, then copied that folder to a CD or DVD, and then manually edited all the registry keys and shortcuts you might be able to get it to work. Or not. I've never tried something like this. Some kind of flash memory would be easier, but even so, getting an extra 5 GB harddrive off of ebay and hooking it up would make more sense, being both cheaper and easier.

 

[oynaz]

Runnig Pinnacle Studio off an optical drive would be painfully slow. With the very low prices on HDDs, it is simply not worth the hassle.

 

[Roguestar]

Originally posted by: MegaVovaN
try these:
http://portableapps.com/

Fantastic stuff. These programs are perfect for running off USB, though to answer the OP's question there are very very few programs that would be able to be installed on CD and work fine there; most portable apps even write some stuff temporarily to the USB drive or to the PC's Temp folder, but you can't write like that onto cache folders (or whatever) on a CD.

 

[Matthias99]

Originally posted by: Roguestar

Originally posted by: MegaVovaN
try these:
http://portableapps.com/

Fantastic stuff. These programs are perfect for running off USB, though to answer the OP's question there are very very few programs that would be able to be installed on CD and work fine there; most portable apps even write some stuff temporarily to the USB drive or to the PC's Temp folder, but you can't write like that onto cache folders (or whatever) on a CD.

In theory, programs should always ask the OS where temporary files are supposed to go and put them there. In practice... it doesn't always happen. Though most programs that use their own scratch files, like professional photo/video editing software, will let you specify where to put the scratch file. Plus many programs may try to write configuration files (or internal logfiles, etc.) to their own directory, which is normally assumed to be writable. Some programs have started to put that sort of thing in a subfolder under "My Documents", which would avoid some of these problems.

As mentioned above, you could try copying the installation folder to a CD/DVD and running it from there. Many programs will need a change in the registry to say where it is really installed, but it might work. You could also -- potentially -- install a program to a CD-RW or DVD-RW mounted in a way that makes it look like a normal read-write filesystem (like DirectCD). But performance will generally be awful, especially for loading up the program -- seek times are hideously bad for optical drives compared with hard disks.

Frankly, you're better off installing things onto a big external HD. If you mount it as the same drive letter all the time, it should work.

Also -- why is this in GH? This is a software question.