Make:

Portable Skype: Run Skype from your iPod

There has been quite a bit of buzz recently surrounding so-called "portable apps".
Portable storage devices such as USB flash sticks (and to a lesser extend, micro HD
drives) are dropping rapidly in price/GB, so why just store stuff on them? There's even
an industry consortium to promote a standard (U3, see www.u3.com ) to facilitate running
apps off portable storage devices. Turns out, you don't actually need a "U3 smart drive"
to do this.

There are a number of reasons for not wanting to install a particular piece of software
directly onto your computer's hard disk (be it privacy, portability etc), but instead carry it
around with you wherever you go and have it ready when you need it. Enter the
"Skyppod" (sort of).

Podding Skype HOW TO (the quick and dirty way, here for Win XP):

1) Download a stable version of Skype that doesn't need to be installed on a PC first.
Version 1.4.14.84 from the U3.com site works well for that purpose and supports
/datapath /removable parameters to be passed to the app:
http://software.u3.com/Product_Details.aspx?ProductId=56
2) Rename the downloaded file .u3p (which is as a matter of fact, a zip file) to .zip and
extract it to a folder.
3) Enable disk/manual mode in iTunes- so the iPod doesn't try to sync and enables disk
mode ( iPod Options > manually manage ... ). The experience reported here is with an
iPod mini 4GB (2nd generation model), which actually has a Hitachi MicroDrive
inside, not flash memory; this might be the better choice for using Skype in
conjunction with portable storage devices, given the fact that the app itself accesses
the storage device several times per minute ( see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skype ) and
flash is known to have limited re-write capability.
4) Create a folder eg, "skype14" on the iPod.
5) Copy the Skype.exe file from the "host" folder (located in the downloaded/extracted
folder) to the "skype14" folder on the iPod.
6) Copy the "data" folder (located in the downloaded/extracted folder) to the "skype14"
folder on the iPod.
7) Create the following 2 lines in a batchfile "StartSkype.bat" with Notepad:
@echo off
start Skype.exe /datapath:"data" /removable

(save as StartSkype.bat to "skype14" folder on the iPod).

8) Optional cosmetics:
In "skype14" create a shortcut of StartSkype.bat and move it to where you'd like to
have it, eg, on the desktop. Rename to something like "StartSkype" from "Shortcut to
StartSkype.bat". In Right mouse click > Properties: Change Run to Minimized (so
you don't see the command promt) and click Change Icon to select something
appropriate like the little telephone icon. Click on the little icon and run Skype from
your iPod!

Note: Remember to log out from Skype when you're done and quitting Skype in the task
bar before unmounting/ejecting the iPod.