Thanks for that, Mark.
> use/abuse of a user's home directory is not much related to PLASTIC -
No. that's why I started a new topic.
> JVM (e.g. java -Djava.io.tmpdir=/disk/scratch) if required.
> "java -Duser.home=/tmp/$USER -jar app.jar".
Anyone know if it is possible to set these up in Webstart so webstarted apps use the place?
Wonder what java.io.tmpdir normally returns in Windows?
T.
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Mark Taylor [mailto:mbt-at-star.bris.ac.uk] On Behalf Of
> Mark Taylor
> Sent: 13 February 2007 15:24
> To: Tony Linde
> Subject: Re: $HOME/.Nooooooo!
>
> On Tue, 13 Feb 2007, Tony Linde wrote:
>
> > I'll raise this again as a separate topic.
> >
> > We're getting problems with (plastic) apps using .Xxxx
> directories to store
> > temporary files.
> >
> > Doing a demo the other day on a (WinXP) machine configured
> by the department
> > (and so not changeable) we kept getting 'profile storage
> space exceeded'
> > messages from the OS. This because all the apps were using
> $HOME/.xxx
> > directories as scratch space: this area in Windows is for
> user profile
> > information not general storage. We need some way that
> users can point to
> > some other 'home' directory for AR/PLASTIC apps.
> >
> > The main offender was Aladin because it stored a couple of
> VOTable files in
> > the $HOME/.aladin directory.
> >
> > Can I ask that anyone writing an application which might be
> run under windows
> > *not* store anything in the $HOME/.xxx type of directory.
> Temporary files
> > should go in the Temp directory and application profiles in a
> > $HOME/Application Data/xxx directory.
> >
> > I see that gaim, firefox, thunderbird etc all do this
> correctly - can someone
> > look up how they handle it and place the advice up here?
>
> Tony and other interested parties,
>
> use/abuse of a user's home directory is not much related to PLASTIC -
> as John said, there is a $HOME/.plastic file, but it's only a
> couple of lines long.
>
> For java applications, the normal place to store temporary files
> is in the directory given by the system property "java.io.tmpdir" -
> this is typically /tmp on Unix, but may be set when invoking the
> JVM (e.g. java -Djava.io.tmpdir=/disk/scratch) if required.
>
> If a java application is writing to a user's home directory
> (and Aladin may have had its reasons for doing this) it is very likely
> doing so by examining (directly or indirectly) the system property
> "user.home". You could change this behaviour by redefining that
> system property when java is invoked, e.g.
> "java -Duser.home=/tmp/$USER -jar app.jar".
>
> Non-java applications will mostly have OS-specific approaches to
> these issues.
>
> Mark
>
> --
> Mark Taylor Astronomical Programmer Physics, Bristol
> University, UK
> m.b.taylor-at-bris.ac.uk +44-117-928-8776
> http://www.star.bris.ac.uk/~mbt/
>
Received on 2007-02-13Z16:36:11