PROJECT
The XDG Base Directory Standard provides a common means for specifying one or more base directories relative to which support files can be located. Using the XDG standard, applications can find and store application specific support files (eg. config files, data caches, etc.) in a universal, clean and robust fashion. The advantages of this standard is that all such files will be found in central locations easily discernible by man and machine. And, if widely adopted, XDG can clear up our HOME directories of all those pesky hidden files.
See XDG Base Directory Standard Specification.
If your program depends on user-relative or system-wide support
files, it will be much improved by using the XDG Base Directory Standard. Not
only does it provide a clean yet flexible standard, it also makes your
life easier. The #find and #select methods make it a
snap to locate support files.
XDG make it easy to enable your application's users to create user-centric or system-centric configuration and support files, and store those files where they see fit --whether in the standard locations or locations of personal preference.
How about turning this:
$ ls -a ~/
.ICEauthority .gconf .qt
.Xauthority .gconfd .rdoc Documents
.Xsession .gem .recently-used Download
.adobe .gftp .recently-used.xbel EMail
.aptitude .gimp-2.4 .ri Friends
.aspell.en.prepl .gitconfig .ruby_inline Jobs
.aspell.en.pws .gksu.lock .rubyrc Mail
.bash_history .gnome .sane Manifest.txt
.bash_logout .gnome2 .shoes Media
.bashrc .gnome2_private .ssh Memento
.bogofilter .gnupg .subversion Music
.cache .gstreamer-0.10 .themes Notebook
.camel_certs .gtk-bookmarks .thumbnails Personal
.compiz .gtk-recordmydesktop .tremulous Photos
.config .gtkrc-1.2-gnome2 .update-manager-core Pics
.dbus .gvfs .update-notifier Pictures
.dbus-keyrings .icons .vim PonyArchive
.dia .irb_history .viminfo Public
.diakonos .irbrc .vimrc Sort
.dmrc .local .vlc Templates
.dvdcss .macromedia .w3m Videos
.dvdrip .metacity .wapi current
.dvdrip-master .mozilla .xine dvdrip-data
.dvdriprc .mplayer .xinitrc links.xml
.eee .mysql_history .xsession-errors programs
.esd_auth .nautilus Archive projects
.etc .openoffice.org2 Art ruby
.evolution .pgadmin3 Bookmarks sandbox
.fastri-index .pgpass Books tags
.fehbg .profile Company tigerops
.fehrc .pulse Contacts
.fontconfig .pulse-cookie Desktop
.fr-KVIe0s .purple Diff.txt
Into this:
$ ls -a ~/
.cache Diff.txt Music Videos
.config Documents Notebook current
.local Download Personal dvdrip-data
Archive EMail Photos links.xml
Art Friends Pics programs
Bookmarks Jobs Pictures projects
Books Mail PonyArchive ruby
Company Manifest.txt Public sandbox
Contacts Media Sort tags
Desktop Memento Templates tigerops
$ gem install xdg
It's really quite easy:
require 'xdg'
XDG['CONFIG']
XDG['CONFIG_HOME']
XDG['CONFIG_DIRS']
XDG['DATA']
XDG['DATA_HOME']
XDG['DATA_DIRS']
XDG['CACHE']
XDG['CACHE_HOME']
XDG['CACHE_DIRS']
All of these base directory reference provide access to a variety of useful methods, e.g.
XDG['CONFIG'].to_s
XDG['CONFIG'].to_a
XDG['CONFIG'].glob(pattern)
XDG['CONFIG'].find(pattern){ |path| ... }
XDG['CONFIG'].select(pattern){ |path| ... }
You can also include XDG base directory mixin into a class and you
will get methods to reference the directories as well. And by
defining #subdirectory the can be tailored specifically
to your application.
class X
include XDG::BaseDir::Mixin
def subdirectory
"foo"
end
end
x = X.new
x.config.home.list #=> ["~/.config/foo"]
