zben@umd5.umd.edu (Ben Cranston) (10/01/89)
In article <4452@internal.Apple.COM> carl@Apple.COM (Carl C. Hewitt) writes: > If I'm not mistaken, Apple DTS has officially sanctified the use of a folder > called "Preferences" in the System Folder for preference files. ... In article <13877@well.UUCP> wdh@well.UUCP (Bill Hofmann) writes: > ... The problem is bigger than it appears: aside from the issue > of what to call it in English, what happens when you go to another country > (I know, if they don't speak English... 8->). In article <4492@internal.Apple.COM> cderossi@Apple.COM (Christopher Derossi) writes: > If you write your code to use a folder named Preferences if it's there, and > to create one [sic] of it isn't, then you're in good shape. Sure, when you > localize your product for another country, you may pick a different name for > the folder than other programs did, but you'd be no worse off than if you > were the only program using the Preferences folder. Perhaps the old hands think this so obvious as not to be worth mentioning, but for the sake of the younger crowd it couldn't hurt to state it explicitly: What we are talking about is that the actual name of the folder should be in a string resource so it can easily be changed when the application is "localized" (translated for use in another country). In the name of standardization Apple should make the (trivial) effort to research the various languages and define a reasonable synonym for "preferences" in each supported language. Apple should then simply add a string resource to SYSTEM with this synonym. This would preserve the configurability of individual applications, because a private resource in an application could override the system resource. So how about it, guys??? > DTS further recommends that you create your own folder within the > Preferences folder for your documents. That way you avoid potential > conflicts, and give the user some reasonable organization. The proper name to give this folder (or file in the trivial case) is a little trickier question. The three alternatives would seem to be: 1. Fixed name within the code of the application (ew, gross). 2. Application resource containing name (e.g. "MyApp Prefs"). 3. Getting the name of the file containing the application itself. Although alternative 3 properly handles the case of deliberately changed application names, it might not always be the right thing to do, because people sometimes do strange things with file names. My personal habit is to append the application's version number to the name (e.g. "MacDraw II 1.0v2"). Applications using alternative 3 would create a separate file or folder, within Preferences, for each version of the application. This might or might not be the right thing to do, depending on the application. -- Sig DS.L ('ZBen') ; Ben Cranston <zben@Trantor.UMD.EDU> * Computer Science Center Network Infrastructures Group * University of Maryland at College Park