How to integrate non-portable apps into the PortableApps Platform?

I have portable apps on my usb and I want to add another portable program not in the .paf format. I searching online and found instructions to create a folder in X:\Portable Apps\name of app to store the program files.

However, the platform finds portable apps install by going to X:\Portable Apps\name of app\app.exe. So if the .exe is hidden among sub folders it wont be recognized. If I create a shortcut in the root directory of the apps folder it still isn't picked up.

As an example, say I want to install the latest version of OBS Studio. How would I get this to display in the PortableApps Platform?

Solution 1:

I modified instructions from How-To Geek and solved the issue by creating an .exe shortcut in the program's root folder.

• Download and save your application to X\PortableApps\ProgramName
• Open a text editor (such as Notepad) and enter the command cd <relative app path> & start <app.exe> ('start' ensures the script exits properly)
  • Example: The command for OBS Studio 64bit would be cd bin/64bit & start obs64.exe, while the command for git-gui would be cd cmd & start git-gui.exe
• Save your script as a .bat file
• (Optional): Extract the icon .ico file from your program to use as an icon for your shortcut
• Convert your .bat into a .exe using Bat To Exe Converter
  • In the program, browse for your .bat batch file with the ... button
  • Select your program's root folder for the "Save as" location
  • Select the "Invisible" option in the Visibility box to run without opening a console window
  • (Optional): Choose a .ico icon in the Versioninformations tab under "Icon file"
• Click compile to generate your .exe shortcut

On the note of OBS, make sure to run it in portable mode by creating a file called portable_mode.txt in your main OBS-Studio folder. This prevents OBS from leaving settings files behind on any of the computers you use.