Program preference standard ?

[ChaosLord]

The only place your program should save its own prefs is in its own dir that it was run from.

[ChaosLord]

The standard location is ENVARC: for the saved configuration and ENV: for the currently used configuration. At boot the ENVARC: content is copied to ENV:. sys directory in this location is reserved for OS preferences.

If your application is a simple one with only need for a single file for preferences you're typically supposed to save them in a appname.prefs. If on the other hand you have several files you should use a subdir appname/file1.prefs appname/file2.prefs etc. As ENV: is stored in RAM: you should avoid storing excessive large files.

When editing settings user is presented with 3 options: Save, Use and Cancel. Save saves the settings to both ENVARC: and ENV:, and the application begins to use the selected configuration. Use saves the settings to ENV: only, and the application begins to use the selected configuration. Cancel discards any changes to the configuration and the application continues to use the old settings.

A very good explanation!

What is the defining characteristic that determines whether an app should save prefs into its own dir (Work:Apps/JoseMegaProggy/JoseMegaProggy.prefs)
vs. saving in ENVARC: and ENV:
?

I have seen some programs save prefs into S: which I really don't like.

[ChaosLord]

@Itix
Does MorphOS support multiuser profiles?

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I generally prefer progs to keep their stuff in their own PROGDIR: because having thousands of files in ENVARC: slows down the booting process.  Of course if a prog has a real need to store stuff in ENVARC: then I am not against it.