Setting $HOME for Windows

Setting $HOME for Windows

[George]

I remember reading some time ago a vague admonition against manually
setting $HOME as a Windows environment variable.  

I can't seem to find the message, so if someone can elaborate on why
this is A Bad Thing, I'd appreciate it.  This is for those of us
pursuing the Holy Grail of integrating Cygwin with Windows (or,
depending on one's view, Windows with Cygwin), and doing our best to
ignore the less-than-holy %USERPROFILE% construct.

--
George


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Re: Setting $HOME for Windows

[Chris Herborth]

George wrote:
> I remember reading some time ago a vague admonition against manually
> setting $HOME as a Windows environment variable.  

I set mine to something sensible (usually d:\home or d:\home\userid) 
before installing Cygwin; I've never had any trouble.  Perhaps the issue 
is with the spaces in the default $USERPROFILE?

-- 
Chris Herborth (cherborth@qnx.com)
Never send a monster to do the work of an evil scientist.


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RE: Setting $HOME for Windows

[Dave Korn]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: cygwin-owner On Behalf Of Chris Herborth
> Sent: 23 December 2004 18:27

> George wrote:
> > I remember reading some time ago a vague admonition against manually
> > setting $HOME as a Windows environment variable.  
> 
> I set mine to something sensible (usually d:\home or d:\home\userid) 
> before installing Cygwin; I've never had any trouble.  
> Perhaps the issue is with the spaces in the default $USERPROFILE?


  The issue is that on a Unix system, you set your home dir by editing
/etc/passwd.  Leave the windoze environment alone.


    cheers, 
      DaveK
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Re: Setting $HOME for Windows

[George]

On Thu, Dec 23, 2004 at 07:00:24PM -0000, Dave Korn wrote:
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: cygwin-owner On Behalf Of Chris Herborth
> > Sent: 23 December 2004 18:27
> 
> > George wrote:
> > > I remember reading some time ago a vague admonition against manually
> > > setting $HOME as a Windows environment variable.  
> > 
> > I set mine to something sensible (usually d:\home or d:\home\userid) 
> > before installing Cygwin; I've never had any trouble.  
> > Perhaps the issue is with the spaces in the default $USERPROFILE?
> 
> 
>   The issue is that on a Unix system, you set your home dir by editing
> /etc/passwd.  Leave the windoze environment alone.
> 

Well, I'd like to leave the windoze environment alone, but that's where
my stuff is, and c:/cygwin/home/myname/mystuff/morestuff is too much
typing.

My question related not to the method by which $HOME is set for use by
Cygwin, but to any possible problems having a $HOME variable set in the
Windows environment, either pre-install or post-install.

Judging from the other replies, I'll assume that everything is hunky
dorey with idea.

-- 
George


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Re: Setting $HOME for Windows

[kurtz]

Dave Korn wrote:
>   The issue is that on a Unix system, you set your home dir by editing
> /etc/passwd.  Leave the windoze environment alone.

I've set for a long time both the HOME windows environment, so other 
win32 native GNU applications are aware of it, and the /etc/password 
entry to the same value, properly /cygpathed/, with any problem.


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Re: Setting $HOME for Windows

[Andrew DeFaria]

George wrote:

> I remember reading some time ago a vague admonition against manually 
> setting $HOME as a Windows environment variable.
>
> I can't seem to find the message, so if someone can elaborate on why 
> this is A Bad Thing, I'd appreciate it. This is for those of us 
> pursuing the Holy Grail of integrating Cygwin with Windows (or, 
> depending on one's view, Windows with Cygwin), and doing our best to 
> ignore the less-than-holy %USERPROFILE% construct.

Personally I believe I arranged for Cygwin's bash shell to utilize the 
actual home field in /etc/passwd (by changing /etc/profile). Next I 
mount <wherever Windows has my home> to /home. In the corporate 
environment where home directories are often stored on a server this 
would be a mount -bsf //server/homeshare /home. Then ls /home lists all 
user's home directories and /etc/passwd says home = /home/$USER.

At home I don't even use that silly C:\Documents and Settings\$USER crap 
and have successfully (though not easily) hacked the registry into using 
C:\Home\<username> and storing all configuration type data into 
C:\Home\<username>\Configuration - but that's me...
-- 
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Re: Setting $HOME for Windows

[Brian Dessent]

Andrew DeFaria wrote:

> At home I don't even use that silly C:\Documents and Settings\$USER crap
> and have successfully (though not easily) hacked the registry into using
> C:\Home\<username> and storing all configuration type data into
> C:\Home\<username>\Configuration - but that's me...

There's no need to hack the registry to do this.  When you install
Windows you can specify the name and location of the "Documents and
Settings" directory (as well as the Windows directory itself.)  You do
this with a response file (winnt.sif) by adding a value "ProfilesDir"
under the [GuiUnattended] section.  When I installed my current copy of
XP I set the profile dir to C:\Users and have not had to touch any
further settings to have everything work fine.

Brian

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Re: Setting $HOME for Windows

[George]

On Thu, Dec 23, 2004 at 12:02:05PM -0800, Brian Dessent wrote:
> Andrew DeFaria wrote:
> 
> > At home I don't even use that silly C:\Documents and Settings\$USER crap
> > and have successfully (though not easily) hacked the registry into using
> > C:\Home\<username> and storing all configuration type data into
> > C:\Home\<username>\Configuration - but that's me...
> 
> There's no need to hack the registry to do this.  When you install
> Windows you can specify the name and location of the "Documents and
> Settings" directory (as well as the Windows directory itself.)  You do
> this with a response file (winnt.sif) by adding a value "ProfilesDir"
> under the [GuiUnattended] section.  When I installed my current copy of
> XP I set the profile dir to C:\Users and have not had to touch any
> further settings to have everything work fine.

Thanks for the reply, Brian.  An unattended install using an answer file
is first on my List of Things To Do Next Time (I've been using reparse
points as a workaround).  I'm still undecided on how to cope with what
gets dumped in %USERPROFILE%, but it might ease the schizophrenia to
have $HOME point to the same dir as %USERPROFILE%.

-- 
George


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