Automate mass download and installation of software

[rafspeik]

Hi there,
I recently had to reinstall Windows 8 for multiple reasons and I have a few hundred (yeah I know) programs that I had to reinstall. As I was doing this I was of course very bored so my mind was wondering and I ended up thinking about the inconceivable amount of things that are possible with modern computing and then suddenly thought would it be possible to automate all of this?
As I can't be bothered to make a list of my software I have a folder with 200+ software installation executables. A lot of these are out of date as I installed the programs and saved the files a long time ago and that was it because most programs update themselves nowadays.

This is my question: would it be possible to somehow automate (batch?) the downloading and installation of these few hundred programs?

 

[USAFRet]

ninite.com does this with a lot of applications. Making a custom one for 'your stuff' would be a non-trivial exercise.

admin password when needed, selecting the right checkboxes, bypassing "Install my toolbar", etc, etc.

 

[rafspeik]

ninite.com does this with a lot of applications. Making a custom one for 'your stuff' would be a non-trivial exercise.

admin password when needed, selecting the right checkboxes, bypassing "Install my toolbar", etc, etc.

Yeah ninite is great, but they don't support a lot of the software I use.

 

[USAFRet]

ninite.com does this with a lot of applications. Making a custom one for 'your stuff' would be a non-trivial exercise.

admin password when needed, selecting the right checkboxes, bypassing "Install my toolbar", etc, etc.

Yeah ninite is great, but they don't support a lot of the software I use.

Right. But getting your personal software stack would be problematic.

 

[rafspeik]

ninite.com does this with a lot of applications. Making a custom one for 'your stuff' would be a non-trivial exercise.

admin password when needed, selecting the right checkboxes, bypassing "Install my toolbar", etc, etc.

Yeah ninite is great, but they don't support a lot of the software I use.

Right. But getting your personal software stack would be problematic.

So there isn't any way for me to find the links to download all my software and have it installed? Or even just download all the latest installers for my software then I install it myself?

 

[USAFRet]

If you keep all the install files, you could theoretically create a batchfile or powershell script to do it.
But for any commercial applications...the actual URL where they store the download may change, and then for many you have to enter a serial number, etc.
And for others, you have to deselect the stupid default toolbars, etc.

 

[rafspeik]

If you keep all the install files, you could theoretically create a batchfile or powershell script to do it.
But for any commercial applications...the actual URL where they store the download may change, and then for many you have to enter a serial number, etc.
And for others, you have to deselect the stupid default toolbars, etc.

OK. That's a shame. Thanks for you help though!