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<< Click to Display Table of Contents >> Navigation: FILES USED BY THE PROGRAM > The Data Directory for the Program |
Because DONATION does not need to be run as a Windows Administrator, and thus is not allowed to create or modify files under C:\Program Files (or C:\Program Files (x64) on 64-bit computers), all data files that are modified by the program must be stored elsewhere.
The directory (also called "folder") that was chosen to store all files that have to be modified is a subdirectory of your Windows All Users Documents directory, which unfortunately varies by the language of your system. For English-language systems, what we call the DONATION "Data Directory" is the following:
C:\Users\Public\Documents\Cooperstock Software\Donation
For the OnDemand Version, the data directory is always S:\Cooperstock Software\Donation, which is on the OnDemand server.
If for some reason you want to see what files are in that folder, you can do so with the Tools ⇒ Explore Data Directory menu option in the program, which brings up a Windows Explorer or Computer type window, showing the contents of that folder and its subfolders.
Please note though that this is not where the actual database file(s) live. They live in a folder underneath the Data Directory, named Data! It's also possible to move the database files to a completely different folder, though we don't recommend it, as long as that folder is on a drive physically connected to your computer (not a network drive that is actually attached to a different computer). See Use the Database on a USB Memory Key for one place you might want to move the database files to, and the instructions for (and warnings about) doing so.
There are other folders under the Data Directory as well. Please see Files Used by the Program to see which files are in the Data Directory and its subdirectories.
We should also mention that when we say that the Data Directory is C:\Users\Public\Documents\Cooperstock Software\Donation, there's a complication. The part of that path called "Documents" actually shows up as "Public Documents" if you drill down to C:\Users\Public and look at the folders under it in programs like Computer or Windows Explorer. That is a weird quirk of Windows, because if you look at in a Command Prompt window it does show up with its "real" name, "Documents". And any programming code must refer to that as "Documents" - if the code refers to it as "Public Documents", it won't be found!