Platform Neutrality¶

In the Unix world, many different types of data can be mixed together in your home directory (although on some Unix platforms this is no longer the case, particularly for "desktop"-oriented platforms).

On some non-Unix platforms, seperate directories are allocated for different types of data and have been for a long time.

When writing applications on top of File::HomeDir, you should thus always try to use the most specific method you can. User documents should be saved in "my_documents", data that supports an application but isn't normally editing by the user directory should go into "my_data".

On platforms that do not make any distinction, all these different methods will harmlessly degrade to the main home directory, but on platforms that care File::HomeDir will always try to Do The Right Thing(tm).

my_home¶

The "my_home" method takes no arguments and returns the main home/profile directory for the current user.

If the distinction is important to you, the term "current" refers to the real user, and not the effective user.

This is also the case for all of the other "my" methods.

Returns the directory path as a string, "undef" if the current user does not have a home directory, or dies on error.

my_desktop¶

The "my_desktop" method takes no arguments and returns the "desktop" directory for the current user.

Due to the diversity and complexity of implementions required to deal with implementing the required functionality fully and completely, for the moment "my_desktop" is not going to be implemented.

That said, I am extremely interested in code to implement "my_desktop" on Unix, as long as it is capable of dealing (as the Windows implementation does) with internationalisation. It should also avoid false positive results by making sure it only returns the appropriate directories for the appropriate platforms.

Returns the directory path as a string, "undef" if the current user does not have a desktop directory, or dies on error.

my_documents¶

The "my_documents" method takes no arguments and returns the directory (for the current user) where the user's documents are stored.

Returns the directory path as a string, "undef" if the current user does not have a documents directory, or dies on error.

my_music¶

The "my_music" method takes no arguments and returns the directory where the current user's music is stored.

No bias is made to any particular music type or music program, rather the concept of a directory to hold the user's music is made at the level of the underlying operating system or (at least) desktop environment.

Returns the directory path as a string, "undef" if the current user does not have a suitable directory, or dies on error.

my_pictures¶

The "my_pictures" method takes no arguments and returns the directory where the current user's pictures are stored.

No bias is made to any particular picture type or picture program, rather the concept of a directory to hold the user's pictures is made at the level of the underlying operating system or (at least) desktop environment.

Returns the directory path as a string, "undef" if the current user does not have a suitable directory, or dies on error.

my_videos¶

The "my_videos" method takes no arguments and returns the directory where the current user's videos are stored.

No bias is made to any particular video type or video program, rather the concept of a directory to hold the user's videos is made at the level of the underlying operating system or (at least) desktop environment.

Returns the directory path as a string, "undef" if the current user does not have a suitable directory, or dies on error.

my_data¶

The "my_data" method takes no arguments and returns the directory where local applications should stored their internal data for the current user.

Generally an application would create a subdirectory such as ".foo", beneath this directory, and store its data there. By creating your directory this way, you get an accurate result on the maximum number of platforms.

For example, on Unix you get "~/.foo" and on Win32 you get "~/Local Settings/Application Data/.foo"

Returns the directory path as a string, "undef" if the current user does not have a data directory, or dies on error.

users_home¶

  $home = File::HomeDir->users_home('foo');

The "users_home" method takes a single param and is used to locate the parent home/profile directory for an identified user on the system.

While most of the time this identifier would be some form of user name, it is permitted to vary per-platform to support user ids or UUIDs as applicable for that platform.

Returns the directory path as a string, "undef" if that user does not have a home directory, or dies on error.

users_documents¶

  $docs = File::HomeDir->users_documents('foo');

Returns the directory path as a string, "undef" if that user does not have a documents directory, or dies on error.

users_data¶

  $data = File::HomeDir->users_data('foo');

Returns the directory path as a string, "undef" if that user does not have a data directory, or dies on error.

home¶

  use File::HomeDir;
  $home = home();
  $home = home('foo');
  $home = File::HomeDir::home();
  $home = File::HomeDir::home('foo');

The "home" function is exported by default and is provided for compatibility with legacy applications. In new applications, you should use the newer method-based interface above.

Returns the directory path to a named user's home/profile directory.

If provided no param, returns the directory path to the current user's home/profile directory.

%~¶

  $home = $~{""};
  $home = $~{undef};
  $home = $~{$user};
  $home = $~{username};
  print "... $~{''} ...";
  print "... $~{$user} ...";
  print "... $~{username} ...";

This calls "home($user)" or "home('username')" -- except that if you ask for $~{some_user} and there is no such user, it will die.

Note that this is especially useful in double-quotish strings, like:

     print "Jojo's .newsrc is ", -s "$~{jojo}/.newsrc", "b long!\n";
      # (helpfully dies if there is no user 'jojo')

If you want to avoid the fatal errors, first test the value of "home('jojo')", which will return undef (instead of dying) in case of there being no such user.

Note, however, that if the hash key is "" or undef (whether thru being a literal "", or a scalar whose value is empty-string or undef), then this returns zero-argument "home()", i.e., your home directory:

Further, please note that because the "%~" hash compulsorily modifies a hash outside of it's namespace, and presents an overly simplistic approach to home directories, it is likely to ultimately be removed.

The interface is currently expected to be formally deprecated from 2010 (but no earlier) and removed from 2015 (but no earlier). If very heavy use is found in the wild, these plans may be pushed back.