Timmy: Yeah, I have a real problem with that…

Doc Duke: If we change the path in the future (say Java 8), then all those apps which have placed stuff in “the wrong place” will break when we make that change.

Timmy: But can’t Java fix this by moving directories it finds in the wrong location to the right one? Maybe even on the McFly!

Doc Duke: But how is Java to know the difference between a home relative path and an absolute “bona-fide I-really-want to-have-this-file, Timmy” path. Your approach might work for your bog standard app that only touches its own self-created directory in the wrong home- move it to the right home and redirect reads and writes. But what about a file utility written in Java, which just enumerates files in home, say perhaps to move them from the wrong place to the right? OK, for those specific cases, you could look for any call to listFiles and set a flag so that they get an actual real world view…

(The Doc trails off, throws his hands in the air and slowly starts walking away from Timmy.)

Doc (starts again): Oh, how slippery a slope that has turned out to be. If Microsoft had rejected such infernal silliness outright, we might actually be living in an alternate timestream in which Windows is actually a stable reliable operating system written by a diligent co-operative Microsoft who works with application developers to keep their well-written apps working instead.

Tim: How is that so, Doc?

Doc Duke: Well, Windows never thinks Fourth Dimensionally enough. Instead, the reality is that Windows is always trying to be clever about stuff like that without caring about of the consequences for some small subset of apps, hiding changed details away by using heuristics to do some bizzaro version of what you mean in unexpected circumstances. I mean, maybe, just maybe its okay to leave crufty old workarounds and hacks in for ten year old versions of Photoshop, but bloody hell, why can’t I call a file COM1 in this day and age!

This bug (which still isn’t fixed in the latest Java 7) has caused so many problems. My main problem was trying to develop for Android in Eclipse. Eclipse, written in Java, stores its settings in the wrong users directory (i.e. Desktop\..\) but the Android SDK looks for the settings in the correct location (C:\Users)!

I didn’t realise that Java used the Desktop path to incorrectly determine the Users directory – I thought it might be “My Documents”, which would screw my backups up. However, I think I can live with keeping C:\Users\\Desktop. So thank you for sharing this!

Andy