Installing and running software on external hard drive.

Hi everyone.

This has probably been asked a few times before, but i can't find any instructions.
I would like to install adobe cs5.5 and Autodesk Maya 2011 onto a external hard drive so that i can take it to a computer at a course. The computers (iMacs running lion) there have been locked therefore i can't install anything onto there internal hard drive. I need be able run the whole software directly from the drive. Is there anyway to do this without making it a hard drive that i launch from at start up.

The hard drive is lacie 500gb Fire wire 800.
Im on a 2.8ghz intel core 17 running osx lion 10.7.3.

I don't think you can run Adobe CS 5.5 from an external hard drive unless you can boot from it. And if the computers are locked you will be unable to boot except from the internal hard drive. I don't know about Maya but I expect that since it's a fairly large and complex program, it too may not be able to run stand alone from an external hard drive.

Isn't there some kind of emulator that simulates a mac environment. Like if i dragged all my files over, my library, applications, and all the places it stores hidden things. Put it all in the same order, name everything the same. Would it work, would the program go to those locations and find the data it needs and launch. I might be talking nonsense but i might as well ask.

What about adobe Cs6 which was just released.

There are no emulators that I know of which emulate a Mac environment, and if there were, it would have to be installed on the iMac to work. I'm sure the latest version of CS 6 is the same.

Are you allowed to bring your own Mac to class and use it instead or are you required to only use the iMacs?

I can take my computer there, but its a 27" iMac. Its not exactly portable.

So there is no other way?

No, sorry. Maybe someone else will come up with something for you. And yes I agree, a 27" iMac is not exactly portable. Sounds like you could use a nice new MacBookPro when they're updated. And that should be real soon.

Okay, ill wait and see.