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The [getStandardFolder] command

This page documents the new [getStandardFolder] command introduced in version 8.1d1 of AlphaX.

Description

The new command [getStandardFolder] has been introduced in order to wrap the ToolBox function of the same name. It returns the full path of certain system-related directories. Optionally this function can create (or attempt to create, depending on the permissions) the folders when they do not exist already.

Synopsis

The syntax of the command is the following:

 
     getStandardFolder ?-create? folderType ?domain?

The arguments have the following signification:

• -create tells to attempt to create the folder if it does not exist. This argument is optional.
• folderType is a four-character code characterizing a particular folder (see below).
• domain is optional. It specifies the domain the folder belongs to. For instance, there are several Fonts directories on the system, corresponding to different domains: /System/Library/Fonts in the System domain, /Library/Fonts in the local domain, or ~/Fonts in the user domain. Possible values for this parameter are: classic, local, network, system, or user. If it is not specified, the default value is system.

Main folder codes

One must pass a four-character folder type for the folder you want to find. The table below indicates the currently available codes. More information can be found on Apple's Developer Connection at http://developer.apple.com/documentation/Carbon/Reference/Folder_Manager/Reference/reference.html#//apple_ref/c/tdef/FolderType

These codes are declared in the Folders.h header found in the CoreServices framework (see /System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/CarbonCore.framework/Versions/A/Headers/Folders.h).

Note: some of the codes in the table above use the ƒ symbol. This is the character of code 196 (0xc4 in hexadecimal) in the MacRoman encoding. It corresponds to the U+0192 code-point in the Utf-8 Unicode encoding form. It is obtained from the keyboard by typing opt-f.

Note: Above list contains only the more commonly used folders. A complete list of codes together with further technical details may be found at http://developer.apple.com/documentation/Carbon/Reference/Folder_Manager/Reference/reference.html#//apple_ref/c/tdef/FolderType.

Examples

Here are some examples to demonstrate the use of the [getStandardFolder] command:

 
    Welcome to AlphaX's AlphaTcl shell.
     «MacOS» version
     AlphaX 8.1d1, Wednesday, 11 January 2006

     «MacOS» info command getStandardFolder
     getStandardFolder

     «MacOS» getStandardFolder asup user
     /Users/bernardo/Library/Application Support/

     «MacOS» getStandardFolder asup local
     /Library/Application Support/

     «MacOS» getStandardFolder flnt user
     Error: 

     «MacOS» getStandardFolder -create flnt user
     /Users/bernardo/Library/Caches/Cleanup At Startup/

(add your comments here...)

Last updated 2006-04-23 10:07:01