pds4_tools.extern.appdirs module

Utilities for determining application-specific dirs.

See <http://github.com/ActiveState/appdirs> for details and usage.

user_data_dir(appname=None, appauthor=None, version=None, roaming=False)

Return full path to the user-specific data dir for this application.

“appname” is the name of application.

If None, just the system directory is returned.

“appauthor” (only used on Windows) is the name of the

appauthor or distributing body for this application. Typically it is the owning company name. This falls back to appname. You may pass False to disable it.

“version” is an optional version path element to append to the

path. You might want to use this if you want multiple versions of your app to be able to run independently. If used, this would typically be “<major>.<minor>”. Only applied when appname is present.

“roaming” (boolean, default False) can be set True to use the Windows

roaming appdata directory. That means that for users on a Windows network setup for roaming profiles, this user data will be sync’d on login. See <http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc766489(WS.10).aspx> for a discussion of issues.

Typical user data directories are:

Mac OS X:               ~/Library/Application Support/<AppName>
Unix:                   ~/.local/share/<AppName>    # or in $XDG_DATA_HOME, if defined
Win XP (not roaming):   C:\Documents and Settings\<username>\Application Data\<AppAuthor>\<AppName>
Win XP (roaming):       C:\Documents and Settings\<username>\Local Settings\Application Data\<AppAuthor>\<AppName>
Win 7  (not roaming):   C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\<AppAuthor>\<AppName>
Win 7  (roaming):       C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Roaming\<AppAuthor>\<AppName>

For Unix, we follow the XDG spec and support $XDG_DATA_HOME. That means, by default “~/.local/share/<AppName>”.

site_data_dir(appname=None, appauthor=None, version=None, multipath=False)

Return full path to the user-shared data dir for this application.

“appname” is the name of application.

If None, just the system directory is returned.

“appauthor” (only used on Windows) is the name of the

appauthor or distributing body for this application. Typically it is the owning company name. This falls back to appname. You may pass False to disable it.

“version” is an optional version path element to append to the

path. You might want to use this if you want multiple versions of your app to be able to run independently. If used, this would typically be “<major>.<minor>”. Only applied when appname is present.

“multipath” is an optional parameter only applicable to *nix

which indicates that the entire list of data dirs should be returned. By default, the first item from XDG_DATA_DIRS is returned, or ‘/usr/local/share/<AppName>’, if XDG_DATA_DIRS is not set

Typical user data directories are:

Mac OS X: /Library/Application Support/<AppName> Unix: /usr/local/share/<AppName> or /usr/share/<AppName> Win XP: C:Documents and SettingsAll UsersApplication Data<AppAuthor><AppName> Vista: (Fail! “C:ProgramData” is a hidden system directory on Vista.) Win 7: C:ProgramData<AppAuthor><AppName> # Hidden, but writeable on Win 7.

For Unix, this is using the $XDG_DATA_DIRS[0] default.

WARNING: Do not use this on Windows. See the Vista-Fail note above for why.

user_config_dir(appname=None, appauthor=None, version=None, roaming=False)

Return full path to the user-specific config dir for this application.

“appname” is the name of application.

If None, just the system directory is returned.

“appauthor” (only used on Windows) is the name of the

appauthor or distributing body for this application. Typically it is the owning company name. This falls back to appname. You may pass False to disable it.

“version” is an optional version path element to append to the

path. You might want to use this if you want multiple versions of your app to be able to run independently. If used, this would typically be “<major>.<minor>”. Only applied when appname is present.

“roaming” (boolean, default False) can be set True to use the Windows

roaming appdata directory. That means that for users on a Windows network setup for roaming profiles, this user data will be sync’d on login. See <http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc766489(WS.10).aspx> for a discussion of issues.

Typical user data directories are:

Mac OS X: same as user_data_dir Unix: ~/.config/<AppName> # or in $XDG_CONFIG_HOME, if defined Win (all): same as user_data_dir

For Unix, we follow the XDG spec and support $XDG_CONFIG_HOME. That means, by deafult “~/.config/<AppName>”.

site_config_dir(appname=None, appauthor=None, version=None, multipath=False)

Return full path to the user-shared data dir for this application.

“appname” is the name of application.

If None, just the system directory is returned.

“appauthor” (only used on Windows) is the name of the

appauthor or distributing body for this application. Typically it is the owning company name. This falls back to appname. You may pass False to disable it.

“version” is an optional version path element to append to the

path. You might want to use this if you want multiple versions of your app to be able to run independently. If used, this would typically be “<major>.<minor>”. Only applied when appname is present.

“multipath” is an optional parameter only applicable to *nix

which indicates that the entire list of config dirs should be returned. By default, the first item from XDG_CONFIG_DIRS is returned, or ‘/etc/xdg/<AppName>’, if XDG_CONFIG_DIRS is not set

Typical user data directories are:

Mac OS X:   same as site_data_dir
Unix:       /etc/xdg/<AppName> or $XDG_CONFIG_DIRS[i]/<AppName> for each value in
            $XDG_CONFIG_DIRS
Win (all):  same as site_data_dir
Vista:      (Fail! "C:\ProgramData" is a hidden *system* directory on Vista.)

For Unix, this is using the $XDG_CONFIG_DIRS[0] default, if multipath=False

WARNING: Do not use this on Windows. See the Vista-Fail note above for why.

user_cache_dir(appname=None, appauthor=None, version=None, opinion=True)

Return full path to the user-specific cache dir for this application.

“appname” is the name of application.

If None, just the system directory is returned.

“appauthor” (only used on Windows) is the name of the

appauthor or distributing body for this application. Typically it is the owning company name. This falls back to appname. You may pass False to disable it.

“version” is an optional version path element to append to the

path. You might want to use this if you want multiple versions of your app to be able to run independently. If used, this would typically be “<major>.<minor>”. Only applied when appname is present.

“opinion” (boolean) can be False to disable the appending of

“Cache” to the base app data dir for Windows. See discussion below.

Typical user cache directories are:

Mac OS X:   ~/Library/Caches/<AppName>
Unix:       ~/.cache/<AppName> (XDG default)
Win XP:     C:\Documents and Settings\<username>\Local Settings\Application Data\<AppAuthor>\<AppName>\Cache
Vista:      C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\<AppAuthor>\<AppName>\Cache

On Windows the only suggestion in the MSDN docs is that local settings go in the ‘CSIDL_LOCAL_APPDATA’ directory. This is identical to the non-roaming app data dir (the default returned by user_data_dir above). Apps typically put cache data somewhere under the given dir here. Some examples:

...\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\<ProfileName>\Cache
...\Acme\SuperApp\Cache\1.0

OPINION: This function appends “Cache” to the ‘CSIDL_LOCAL_APPDATA’ value. This can be disabled with the opinion=False option.

user_log_dir(appname=None, appauthor=None, version=None, opinion=True)

Return full path to the user-specific log dir for this application.

“appname” is the name of application.

If None, just the system directory is returned.

“appauthor” (only used on Windows) is the name of the

appauthor or distributing body for this application. Typically it is the owning company name. This falls back to appname. You may pass False to disable it.

“version” is an optional version path element to append to the

path. You might want to use this if you want multiple versions of your app to be able to run independently. If used, this would typically be “<major>.<minor>”. Only applied when appname is present.

“opinion” (boolean) can be False to disable the appending of

“Logs” to the base app data dir for Windows, and “log” to the base cache dir for Unix. See discussion below1.

Typical user cache directories are:

Mac OS X:   ~/Library/Logs/<AppName>
Unix:       ~/.cache/<AppName>/log  # or under $XDG_CACHE_HOME if defined
Win XP:     C:\Documents and Settings\<username>\Local Settings\Application Data\<AppAuthor>\<AppName>\Logs
Vista:      C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\<AppAuthor>\<AppName>\Logs

On Windows the only suggestion in the MSDN docs is that local settings go in the ‘CSIDL_LOCAL_APPDATA’ directory. (Note: I’m interested in examples of what some windows apps use for a logs dir.)

OPINION: This function appends “Logs” to the ‘CSIDL_LOCAL_APPDATA’ value for Windows and appends “log” to the user cache dir for Unix. This can be disabled with the opinion=False option.

class AppDirs(appname, appauthor=None, version=None, roaming=False, multipath=False)

Bases: object

Convenience wrapper for getting application dirs.

property user_data_dir

property site_data_dir

property user_config_dir

property site_config_dir

property user_cache_dir

property user_log_dir