July 2013 Project of the Month: WinPenPack

By rgaloppini

SourceForge is proud to announce June’s project of the month, WinPenPack, an open source software environment comprised of several portable applications grouped into suites. To learn more about WinPenPack we talked to Danilo Leggieri, the original author and current project coordinator.

WinPenPack project page
WinPenPack website
WinPenPack community FAQ
WinPenPack download

WinPenPack

SourceForge: Tell us about WinPenPack. What is it?

Briefly we can say that winPenPack is an Open Source project that deals with portable software, both natively portable and portabilized by means of X-Launcher, our portable program launcher. These apps can be grouped into suites or can be used also as standalone portable programs, adapting with end users preferences.
With winPenPack, any USB flash drive ceases to be a simple data storage device and becomes a self-contained environment, within which programs and files are homogeneously integrated.
Portable applications included in the winPenPack suites do not require any installation, do not leave their files or settings on the host computer, and can be easily transferred to another computer through any external device, such as a removable hard disk drive or a USB flash drive.
All you have to do is connect a USB flash drive to any free USB port on your host PC, and you will have your collection of pre-configured and ready-to-use programs instantly available, grouped in categories and executable through a user-friendly menu interface similar to the Start Menu, the winPenPack Menu. It will be exactly as if you are working on your own PC, with web browsers, e-mail clients, image and drawing editors, chat clients, multimedia tools, PC maintenance and security tools, school and development tools, and other.
winPenPack philosophy is well summarized by our (very restrictive) definition of “portable software”: a portable program can’t simply be a “no-install” program, but must also be able to save its settings into his own folder (or a user-definable folder), does not write settings or leave other data in user folders (e.g. into c:\Users\TheUserName\AppData\Roaming\ or c:\Documents and Settings\TheUserName) or into the registry, must be able to run from a USB pen drive and can perform path normalizations moving around different PCs (where the pen drive could be installed with different drive letters). Obviously, all of these programs can be executed also from hard drives, greatly simplifying recovery operations of all programs (and their preferred configurations) when reinstalling the operating system.

SourceForge: How long have you been doing this?

Our project started in November 2005. Me and a couple of “web friends” expanded the project and our community grew up very quickly. Since that date, we have issued about 20 new releases and hundreds of Open Source portable applications. Actually, the project is well known in Italy and is growing also abroad. All our collections/suites are regularly distributed also in bundle with some IT magazines. The community of users has grown over the years and has actively contributed to the growth of the whole project. The site currently hosts various projects created and suggested also by forum members, and is also used for bug reporting and users suggestions.

SourceForge: Is development of the platform very active, or is it primarily focused on adding new applications?

Actually the main project has reached a good state of stability and security. Anyway we are always involved on, so we are working on a new update in short time. Current steps are dedicated to improve the usability “on the go” with a new release of X-Launcher. In the main time we are upgrading all current X-Portable releases (that can be downloaded also standalone, not integrated in our suites) with the new version of the X-Launcher.

SourceForge: How many people are actively involved in the development of this project? (you might to tell a bit about your different roles)

Actually, our project involves 6 “officially active” elements and a lot of part-time contributors (translators, testers, and so on). All of them are spending their time completely for free, working on the project out of pure passion. Each member of the staff has a different job in “normal life”, not necessarily connected to the world of computer and information technology. We are also supported by some (few) skilled final users, always ready to help us with their feed-back on our forum.

SourceForge: How do you coordinate the project, and how you decide which application needs to be included next?

Due to the good stability and usability reached by the project, the main activity of the staff is now focused on keeping it daily updated and fine tuned. Our “information interchange method” is 90% our forum in the dedicated area for staff and admins. Anyway we are always tuned to incorporate the requirements coming from our end users and guests. In this case we use our forum to keep information coming from the users mainly in two “suggestion areas”: “Portable Software submission” and “Portabilization Requests”.
To maintain this activity under control and ordered, we also prepared a “how-to” for newcomers, which allows us to quickly evaluate proposals and requests. Our interest, in the viewpoint of development and diffusion of free portable software, aims Open Source software (GPL, LGPL, MPL, MIT, etc..). Since for license reasons changes on Freeware software are not allowed, the request must regard exclusively programs released under Open Source licenses, otherwise it will be moved to “Programs that CAN’T be made portable” forum section.
In our forum we have also a “Development Area”: also in this case only software released under Open Source licenses is eligible for X-Software development. Freeware, Shareware and Commercial software are excluded due to license restrictions that do not allow modifications.

SourceForge: If someone wanted to get involved in your project, 1) what kind of skills would they need and 2) what would need to be done?

Becoming a members of the “Developers” group (if enough skilled), and/or participating in the development of winPenPack components is not so difficult. In any case, first of all any candidate must be a passionate supporter and lover of portable/made portable software. Our doors are always opened for anyone wants to passionately participate by developing portable software based on winPenPack technology (X-Software).
The contribution can be made also in other different ways. Of course, we allow each one to make its contribution in the manner and quantity that it seems most appropriate to his abilities and knowledge. Some possible helps are: constructively participating in forum threads, assisting the Team in supporting the activities of moderation and user support, suggesting new portable programs (as specified in our submission procedure) and/or testing the portability of those currently present, writing new FAQs and/or translating in English the existing ones, transating portions of the site pages, writing tutorials and helping us to extend and improve all documentation, and so on.
Last but not least, we want to remember that winPenPack is completely free software developed by volunteers who offer their work for free, and it will remain so in the future. Anyone do not have to pay us anything for downloading and using winPenPack. However, if someone wants to donate for supporting its maintenance and development, will be really welcome!

SourceForge: How close are you to deliver a new version?

As already said before, actually we are hardly involved to release a new version of X-Launcher with some improvements in terms of usability, to keep all the project always fresh and tuned. In the main time all portable (“X-Software” and natively portable), are updated at last version almost daily or, at least, weekly. Also our suites will be updated in short time with new improvements. But this last activity will take a bit more time, we have a lot of programs to keep tuned with new updates. Some days ago, we have just released a new version of our “winPenpack Net Menu”.

SourceForge: Thanks so much for your time Danilo, and congratulations again.

One Response

  1. […] extremely useful tool from our friends at SourceForge.net. Here is the link for information http://sourceforge.net/blog/potm-201307/ and downloading WinPenPack. […]