MantisBT - Zandronum
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IDProjectCategoryView StatusDate SubmittedLast Update
0001014Zandronum[All Projects] Bugpublic2012-09-06 00:192014-06-12 20:26
Reporterjswagner 
Assigned To 
PrioritynormalSeveritymajorReproducibilityalways
StatusclosedResolutionwaiting for zdoom 
PlatformMicrosoftOSWindowsOS VersionXP/Vista/7
Product Version1.0 
Target VersionFixed in Version 
Summary0001014: Zandronum saves user data to whatever folder it was installed to.
DescriptionBasically, Zandronum on Windows always behaves as if it were a portable installation, even if it was not installed as such.

On Windows Vista and higher, the default installation path is protected by UAC. UAC will redirect writes to this folder to users who install Zandronum to the default location will find their zandronum-%UserName%.ini files saved to %UserProfile%\AppData\Local\VirtualStore\Program Files (x86)\Zandronum.

(The uninstaller doesn't know to clean up the Zandronum folder in the UAC VirtualStore, either, so it is not possible for a non-technical user to 'start over' by uninstalling and reinstalling Zandronum.)

On Windows XP and earlier, Zandronum will be able to write to the default installation path, but that means every user on the local system will share the same game configuration.
Steps To ReproduceInstall Zandronum on an untouched Win7 installation (UAC enabled, with no file system permissions altered) to the default %ProgramFiles% location offered by the installer.

Run Zandronum and point to your IWADs.

Pick an IWAD to start the engine.

Quit Zandronum.

Run Zandronum again. It should not ask where your IWADs are, but instead, which IWAD you wish to use.

Note that data has been saved to the user's UAC virtual store.

Compare this behavior to the final distributed build of SkullTag, where data is stored in %AppData%\Skulltag\skulltag.ini.
Additional InformationI'm filing this bug primarily because it seems like a regression from the SkullTag behavior, which seems more obvious and desirable, especially since some users will want to edit their .INI files directly (and the wiki instructs them to do so).

It's unrealistic to expect all Windows users not to install to the installer's recommended location, it seems the best option would be to re-inherit SkullTag's old behavior, which was to save user data to %AppData%\$APPNAME\$APPNAME.ini.

Let me know if you need any further details.
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Issue History
Date ModifiedUsernameFieldChange
2012-09-06 00:19jswagnerNew Issue
2012-09-06 00:24BalrogNote Added: 0004598
2012-09-06 01:31jswagnerNote Added: 0004599
2012-09-15 19:42Torr SamahoNote Added: 0004674
2014-06-12 20:26WatermelonStatusnew => closed
2014-06-12 20:26WatermelonResolutionopen => waiting for zdoom

Notes
(0004598)
Balrog   
2012-09-06 00:24   
Before anyone gets too literal and ends up breaking portable installs, this should probably be implemented by having zandronum.exe check for a registry key in HKEY_CURRENT_USER that the installer sets, with the presence of an .ini file in the same folder overriding the registry key.
(0004599)
jswagner   
2012-09-06 01:31   
Makes sense.

I obviously goofed a rewrite, I meant to write this:

"On Windows Vista and higher, the default installation path is protected by UAC. UAC will redirect writes to the user's virtual store. Users will find their zandronum-%UserName%.ini files saved to %UserProfile%\AppData\Local\VirtualStore\Program Files (x86)\Zandronum."
(0004674)
Torr Samaho   
2012-09-15 19:42   
ZDoom (and Zandronum inherited this behavior) intentionally saves the ini to its application folder. The following comment regarding this is in the ZDoom source:
// Because people complained, try for a user-specific .ini in the program directory first.


I'd like to stay consistent with ZDoom, so please request this at the ZDoom forum first.