SpecialFolder

Class (inherits from Object)

Used to get a FolderItem for a specific folder or directory managed by the host operating system.

Methods

Usage

result = SpecialFolder.FolderName

Part	Type	Description
result	FolderItem	If successful, a FolderItem for the specified folder/directory. SpecialFolder returns Nil if the call is unsuccessful.
FolderName	String literal	The requested folder or directory. See the table in the Notes section for the possible values.

Folder Names and Paths

These names and paths are from Windows 10 (64-bit), macOS 10.12.5 and Mint 18.1 (64-bit). The paths may differ slightly on other operating systems and versions.

FolderName	Windows	macOS	Linux
AppleMenu Deprecated in 2013r1	\Users\UserName\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\	Nil	Nil
ApplicationData	\Users\UserName\AppData\Roaming\	/Users/UserName/Library/Application Support	/home/UserName/
Applications	\Program Files\ or \Program Files (x86)\	/Applications	Nil
Bin	Nil	/bin	/bin/
Cookies	\Users\UserName\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\INetCookies\	/Users/UserName/Library/Cookies	Nil
CurrentWorkingDirectory	Current working directory (depends on the location of the application). When run from Xojo, it is the path to Xojo. In a built app, it is the path to the built app.	Current working directory (depends on the location of the application). Usually "/".	Current working directory at the time the application was launched (uses getcwd).
Desktop	\Users\UserName\Desktop\	/Users/UserName/Desktop	/home/UserName/Desktop/
Documents	\Users\UserName\Documents\	/Users/UserName/Documents	/home/UserName/Documents/
Etc	Nil	/private/etc	/etc/
Extensions	\Windows\System32\	Nil	Nil
Favorites	\Users\UserName\Favorites\	/Users/UserName/Library/Favorites	Nil
Fonts	\Windows\Fonts\	/System/Library/Fonts	Nil
GetFromDomainAndCode (domain as Integer, fourCharCode as String)	Raises PlatformNotSupportedException	Pass a class constant for the domain and a four-character code of a specific FolderItem The constants are: DomainSystem - currently folders inside '/System' DomainLocal - currently folders inside '/Library' DomainUser - currently folders inside the user's home folder	Raises PlatformNotSupportedException
History	\Users\UserName\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\History\	/Users/UserName/Sites	Nil
Home	Nil	/Users	/home/
InternetCache	\Users\UserName\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\INetCache\	/Users/UserName/Library/Caches	/home/UserName/.cache
Library	Nil	/Library	/lib/
Mount	Nil	/Volumes	/mnt/
Movies	\Users\UserName\Videos\	/Users/UserName/Movies	/home/UserName/Videos/
Music	\Users\UserName\Music\	/Users/UserName/Music	/home/UserName/Music/
NetworkPlaces	\Users\UserName\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Network Shortcuts\	Nil	Nil
Pictures	\Users\UserName\Pictures\	/Users/UserName/Pictures	/home/UserName/Pictures/
Preferences	\Users\UserName\AppData\Roaming\	/Users/UserName/Library/Preferences On macOS, use SpecialFolder.ApplicationData to save your own files or directly call CFPreferences to save preferences files here.	/home/UserName/
Printers	\Users\UserName\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Printer Shortcuts\	/System/Library/Printers	Nil
RecentItems	\Users\UserName\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Recent\	/Users/UserName/Library/Recent Documents	Nil
Resources	MyApp Folder\Resources	MyApp.app/Contents/Resources	MyApp Folder/Resources
SBin	Nil	/sbin	/sbin/
SendTo	\Users\UserName\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\SendTo\	Nil	Nil
SharedApplicationData	\ProgramData\	/Library/Application Support	Nil
SharedApplications	\Program Files\Common Files\ or \Program Files (x86)\Common Files\	Nil	Nil
SharedDesktop	\Users\Public\Desktop\	Nil	Nil
SharedDocuments	\Users\Public\Documents\	/Users/Shared	Nil
SharedFavorites	\Users\UserName\Favorites\	Nil	Nil
SharedPreferences	\ProgramData\	/Library/Preferences	Nil
SharedStartupItems	\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\StartUp\	Nil	Nil
SharedTemplates	\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Templates\	Nil	Nil
StartupItems	\Users\UserName\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\	Nil	Nil
System	\Windows\System32\	/System	Nil
Templates	\Users\UserName\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Templates\	Nil	Nil
Temporary	\Users\UserName\AppData\Local\Temp\	/private/var/folders/gp/.../T/TemporaryItems (varies)	/tmp/
Trash(relativeToVolume As FolderItem=Nil)	\Users\UserName\Desktop\Recycle Bin\	/Users/UserName/.Trash	Nil
UserBin	Nil	/usr/bin	/usr/bin/
UserHome	\Users\UserName\	/Users/UserName	/home/UserName/
UserLibrary	Nil	/Users/UserName/Library	/usr/lib/
UserSBin	Nil	/usr/sbin	/usr/sbin/
Var Removed in 2019r1. Use Variable instead.	n/a	n/a	n/a
Variable	Nil	/private/var	/var/
VarLog Removed in 2019r1. Use VariableLog instead.	n/a	n/a	n/a
VariableLog	Nil	/private/var/log	/var/log/
Windows	\Windows\	Nil	Nil

Xojo Cloud

For Xojo Cloud, these are the only SpecialFolder methods that are usable. All others return Nil:

Fonts
SharedDocuments: The web server Shared_Documents folder.
Documents: The Documents folder within the web app folder.
Temporary: The web server tmp folder.

Notes

Not all types of folders are supported on all operating systems. After a call to SpecialFolder, check that the result not Nil. Please note that in a web app on a server, some folders do not exist. Like if your web app runs with Apache as CGI with the apache user, there will be no desktop folder.

On macOS, SpecialFolder.Temporary returns an item in the OS's TemporaryItems directory for the current user. The path contains a long system-defined string that cannot be specified. It looks similar to this:

 :private:var:folders:pX:pXijpazEF5aGY39FGy9H7k+++TI:TemporaryItems:

On 64-bit versions of Windows, 32-bit applications created with Xojo will map SpecialFolder.Applications to "Program Files (x86)" instead of "Program Files".

Sample Code

The following code gets a FolderItem for the Application Data folder and displays its native path.

Var f As FolderItem
f = SpecialFolder.ApplicationData
If f <> Nil Then
MessageBox(f.NativePath)
Else
MessageBox("There is no Application Data folder on this computer.")
End If

The following example returns a FolderItem for the Documents directory on Windows and Mac OS X and the Home directory on Linux.

Var f As FolderItem
If Not TargetLinux Then
f = SpecialFolder.Documents
Else
f = SpecialFolder.Home
End If

If f <> Nil Then
// proceed normally
Else
MessageBox("FolderItem does not exist!")
End If