File.expand_path and ~ on windows

ruby-talk
1

FWIW, it is possible to set a HOME directory. On XP Pro: Control Panel →
User Accounts → Advanced → Users.

Then, right click on a given user and click “properties” and click the
“profile” tab. There you should see a “home folder” option. This is what
sets the LPUSER_INFO_11 struct value for the usri11_home_dir member.

So, in theory you can get a user’s home dir like this:

Available on RAA - shameless plug

require “sys/win32etc”
include Sys

home = Win32Etc.getpwnam(“some_user”).home_dir

However, it seems that in practice this value is rarely set (it wasn’t in
any of the 3 machines that I tested) and that %HOME% should be the first
default.

Regards,

Dan

···

-----Original Message-----
From: Sean O’Dell [mailto:sean@cSePlsoAfMt.com[REMOVE_THE_SPAM]]
Sent: Friday, September 19, 2003 10:19 AM
To: ruby-talk@ruby-lang.org
Subject: Re: File.expand_path and ~ on windows

Austin Ziegler wrote:

On Fri, 19 Sep 2003 11:36:28 +0900, Tom Felker wrote:

Wouldn’t it make more sense to expand it to My Documents
(C:\Documents
and Settings\Username\My Documents on WinXP)? I suppose it
would be
worthwhile to be able to disable it, though.

No. ~ has no meaning to Windows shells. There are times when I wish
that it
didn’t to Unix shells. After all, that’s what ${HOME} is for.

This is true; but I think for portability reasons, since COMMAND.COM
isn’t exactly what I would call a culture of shell idioms, ~
and ${HOME}
(%HOME%) should be considered synonymous. If not ~, then at least
${HOME} ought to point to C:\Documents and Settings\UserName I think.

Sean O’Dell

2

Berger, Daniel wrote:

···

-----Original Message-----
From: Sean O’Dell [mailto:sean@cSePlsoAfMt.com[REMOVE_THE_SPAM]]
Sent: Friday, September 19, 2003 10:19 AM
To: ruby-talk@ruby-lang.org
Subject: Re: File.expand_path and ~ on windows

Austin Ziegler wrote:

On Fri, 19 Sep 2003 11:36:28 +0900, Tom Felker wrote:

Wouldn’t it make more sense to expand it to My Documents

(C:\Documents

and Settings\Username\My Documents on WinXP)? I suppose it

would be

worthwhile to be able to disable it, though.

No. ~ has no meaning to Windows shells. There are times when I wish
that it
didn’t to Unix shells. After all, that’s what ${HOME} is for.

This is true; but I think for portability reasons, since COMMAND.COM
isn’t exactly what I would call a culture of shell idioms, ~
and ${HOME}
(%HOME%) should be considered synonymous. If not ~, then at least
${HOME} ought to point to C:\Documents and Settings\UserName I think.

Sean O’Dell

FWIW, it is possible to set a HOME directory. On XP Pro: Control Panel →
User Accounts → Advanced → Users.

Then, right click on a given user and click “properties” and click the
“profile” tab. There you should see a “home folder” option. This is what
sets the LPUSER_INFO_11 struct value for the usri11_home_dir member.

So, in theory you can get a user’s home dir like this:

Available on RAA - shameless plug

require “sys/win32etc”
include Sys

home = Win32Etc.getpwnam(“some_user”).home_dir

However, it seems that in practice this value is rarely set (it wasn’t in
any of the 3 machines that I tested) and that %HOME% should be the first
default.

That’s interesting; it’s there in Win2k as well.

I would say (in agreement) that ~ should first be wherever %HOME% points
to, then wherever the home directory is set in the registry (if it’s not
an empty/whitespace-filled string) and THEN C:\Documents and
Settings\UserName after that. /whew

Sean O'Dell
3

In Windows, %HOME% is replaced with %USERPROFILE%.

The “home dir” that you found is related to domain controllers (Windows NT
networking).

-austin

···

On Sat, 20 Sep 2003 01:45:14 +0900, Berger, Daniel wrote:

FWIW, it is possible to set a HOME directory. On XP Pro:
Control Panel → User Accounts → Advanced → Users.

Then, right click on a given user and click “properties” and click the
“profile” tab. There you should see a “home folder” option. This is
what sets the LPUSER_INFO_11 struct value for the usri11_home_dir member.

So, in theory you can get a user’s home dir like this:

Available on RAA - shameless plug

require “sys/win32etc”
include Sys

home = Win32Etc.getpwnam(“some_user”).home_dir

However, it seems that in practice this value is rarely set (it wasn’t in
any of the 3 machines that I tested) and that %HOME% should be the first
default.

–
austin ziegler * austin@halostatue.ca * Toronto, ON, Canada
software designer * pragmatic programmer * 2003.09.19
* 13.28.35