OT: Computer's...gotta hate 'em.

[Thermodyne]

Imperator Fyron said:
Most apps I use don't need to use the registry. The tiny number that do can just be reinstalled as needed. Using the registry for user level apps was a terrible invention anyways. Hopefully Vista does away with it and makes apps keep their own data (hopefully in a sensible manner using XML or so)...

The goal here is to separate the operating system from the user level apps as much as possible. *nix makes this easy with mount points. TweakUI can let you approximate it tolerably.

Last I heard, weren’t you a CS major?

I don’t have any idea what apps you use, but based on your statement, I have a good idea about what you don’t use.

With windows XP and to some extent 2K, the whole idea is to gain app performance by integrating applications into the OS. All of the major applications I work with daily use windows integration. Office 03 and XP both use it. Autodesk uses it. Micro station uses it. Adobe uses it. Roxio, Intuit, Adaptec, Cisco, Firefox, Plextor, Symantec, Peachtree just to name a few. I can’t recall seeing an app come out in the last couple of years that didn’t write to the registry. There is just too much to be gained from integration not to go wit it. I’d have to go back to something like Office 97 probably, before finding one without it. In the business world, if it installs locally these days, it’s integrated. Even some of the big web front-end’d db apps install clients to integrate themselves with windows.

Just out of curiosity, what apps do you run?

[Fyron]

Last I heard, weren’t you a CS major?

Computer engineering, but close enough.

With windows XP and to some extent 2K, the whole idea is to gain app performance by integrating applications into the OS.

Which is precisely why IE bugs are such a security problem... integration into the OS. But that's at a much deeper level, into the kernel itself, so bad totally from a technical standpoint rather than aesthetics. Sometimes, marginal performance gains should be sacrificed.

I can’t recall seeing an app come out in the last couple of years that didn’t write to the registry.

Apps that need to be installed to create registry keys and can't just be run after copying the installed folder over (or after wiping and reinstalling the OS) are highly annoying apps. Those are what I try to keep to a minimum. Apps should be robust enough to recreate required registry keys (or stored settings files, however they store their config data) if it is missing.

This is primarily what I was thinking of when I typed about apps I use not needing the registry, rather than not using it at all. I think I mistyped on that bit. A number of the apps I like do happen to keep all of their data locally instead of registry, however.

Just out of curiosity, what apps do you run?

Apps that keep their data locally:
Foobar2000
MPC (though it usually gets reinstalled with codec packs, since those are a pain to set up manually)
bblean
xplorer2
CKRename
Dscalar
Icecast
LAME
Oddcast (though now as a plugin of Foobar2000)
SlimServer
DosBox
Various classic games and emulators

Apps that use registry but are happy to rebuild themselves:
EditPlus (though contemplating migration to Notepad++)
Gaim
FileZilla
SE4
WinSCP
EAC
Spybot
Irfanview

Apps that I reinstall either way:
Kerio
AVG
Driver stuff
K-lite Video codec pack (plus MPC and Quicktime Alternative)
Nero
cygwin
Visual Studio 2003 (stay away from 2005!)
Various poorly written games that don't recover well

Apps that I have only used recently so don't know:
FolderShare
Skype
Psi
VirtualDub

I think that about covers it. Probably miscategorized some things, but meh.