ipfs / ipfs/ipfs-desktop

Store files in the proper location on Windows.

Open
#1,656 11 comments 1 reaction 0 assignees View on GitHub
area/windows effort/days exp/wizard help wanted kind/maintenance P2
Dominant language
JavaScript
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Avg merge
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Merged PRs (30d)
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Description

- OS: Windows
- Version of IPFS Desktop: 0.12.2

**Describe the bug**
Installing IPFS Desktop on Windows results in folders in %USERPROFILE% as well as cache and DB files in the roaming profile.

**To Reproduce**
Steps to reproduce the behavior:
1. Install IPFS Desktop on Windows
2. Notice that you have a `.ipfs` and `.ipfs-desktop` folder in `%USERPROFILE%` and `%APPDATA/IPFS Desktop` contains cache files, databases, blob storage, etc.

**Expected behavior**
Cache files, file storage, databases, and per-machine configuration should all be stored in `%LOCALAPPDATA%/ipfs/`. Per user configuration (I'm not sure if IPFS has any of this, maybe the list of pinned files?) should be stored in `%APPDATA%/ipfs/`. Nothing should be stored in `%USERPROFILE%` (aka: `%HOME%`) unless the user *explicitly tells the app to do so such as via a save dialog box.

**Additional context**
Both Linux and OSX also have environment variables that instruct applications where the appropriate place for files is. I believe it is called XDG_CONFIG though I'm not personally familiar with it.

Contributor guide

No contributing guide indexed for this repository

Research direction

No source files, tests, or entry points are named in the issue. Reproduce the Windows installation and trace where the .ipfs, .ipfs-desktop, cache, database, blob storage, and configuration paths are selected. Done means machine data uses %LOCALAPPDATA%/ipfs/, per-user configuration uses %APPDATA%/ipfs/, and nothing is written to %USERPROFILE% without explicit user choice.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
javascript
Domain
desktop, operating-systems
Issue type
Bug
Difficulty
4/5
Estimated time
3-5 days
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
35/100

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