ELI5- Why do I have to install a programm on a computer. Why can’t I just use it as I download the file or boot it from the disc?
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Booting a program from just one file or from a disk means that anything the program might possibly want, it needs to have packed up with it.
When you go on a vacation or holiday, you probably take a bag with you with some things you might need. It can let you do some essential things, but not quite as many things as you could probably do if you had access to everything you had laying around in your home. You *could* just pack a bigger bag and take more of it with you, but at some point it just becomes too cumbersome to lug around, so it’s not worth it.
On top of that, even if you do have everything you truly need in your packed bag, it could be cumbersome to get it out of the bag without completely unpacking it. At some point you’re going to want to be able to put your bag somewhere like a hotel room where you can completely unpack all of the things you’re going to need often.
Computer programs are the same way, really. They *could* just keep all of the bits and bobs they need to run packed with them in a little digital suitcase. But sometimes they just need more stuff than the little suitcase can hold before the suitcase becomes too big and heavy to use. Or, they need to grab things out of the suitcase really often, and having to dig through the suitcase is just way too slow, so they’d rather unpack it somewhere where it’s easier to get at everything. Both of these problems are solved by installing the software to your computer. It’s more or less exactly what installing is, really.
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