[CP5670]

That's the issue though, it's not a single-user machine, it's multi-user, whether just one person is using it or not.  It's the old DOS/Win9x mentality, where you, the user, is basically God on that machine.  On a modern, multi-user OS, you want to be a normal man, and humble man, and just be allowed to mess around with your tiny corner of the world.  It's fine to go play God occasion, but it's not really a job that you want full-time.

In other words, you don't really want to run as a user which has the power to do anything.  What you want is full control over your tiny bit of the computer and only switch to an admin user when you need to (to add something new to the system, or remove something).  System wide files and config can't be changed by you normally, which means that viruses and nasty little spyware programs have great difficulty messing up your computer.  Once you start doing this, and get used to it, it's actually kind of nice.

I still don't see how this is actually a good thing for a home system though (by single user, I actually meant one physical user). I want to be the full-time god. As it stands, I can already keep out viruses and spyware effectively with a decent hardware firewall, occasional AV program runs and some common sense with browsers and email attachments. For me, the miniscule risk of getting a virus through all that is quite acceptable when compared to the alternative, which is to have to switch accounts every time I wanted to change something in a program directory or install/remove programs. I would personally find that an enormous hassle. The "DOS/9x mentality" is the superior and more efficient one for my purposes.

It can't be selectable by it's very nature.  It's all or nothing.  But it doesn't really have anything to do with cross-platform support, it has to do with supporting current and future Windows versions.  We do it with the Linux and OS X builds because that is simply how it's done.  Windows is getting to that point, and is largely there already, so we are just playing catch-up on that side.

Well, you have said several times that it's simply done that way, but not why. I suppose I'll have to just put up with it if you decide to put the files into Documents and Settings, but it would be one more thing I have to keep track of when transporting my FS2 stuff around, which I actually end up doing fairly often.

[taylor]

Well, you have said several times that it's simply done that way, but not why.

Because Linux and OS X are true multi-user OSes.  Apple usability standards require it on the Mac, and Linux, being a UNIX, is where you don't/can't run as God.  Normal accounts and priviledged accounts actually work differently there and programs will actually work differently based on whether you are superuser or not.  So, you run as an unpriviledged user, and only switch to admin if you need to change something that you don't otherwise have access to.  You'll often find Windows networks setup this way to, with each machine running as an unpriviledged user.

The problem is that Microsoft has always been behind the times here.  OS X users made the switch easily (OS9 and below didn't do the same thing btw), but Microsoft has babied it's users too much and now most of them just don't know any better.  Modern OSes are just too complicated to run the with the old DOS mentality of security.  You can't just protect your computer from outside forces now, you need to protect it from yourself too.  Doing otherwise is just stupid at this point.  ... Not that I mind it too much though, I make up to $1500 a day fixing stuff like that for other people.

[miskat]

Honeslty... I don't care where my files are stored, as long as it makes sense.  The way Windows is moving makes sense in a network or a multi-user enviornment.  My only issue is that ALL operating systems are doing this.  It's getting to be that essentially, all operating systems are the same, doing relatively thesame things in a variety of ways.  It's like... pick your flavor.  I'd like to see a version of Windows or Linux made for a single user.

Gotta love how Microsoft gave up on DOS though, huh?  How's that for irony?  All OSes are based on Unix now.  XD  Go figure. Well... except maybe some of the more obscure ones like BeOS.  XD  Dunno about those.

[Turey]

So, it will move to an %APPDATA% type thing

This is a (minor) pain for me with respect to the installer, but I'll make do.

[Mongoose]

So long as you don't throw the data in a folder in My Documents, I'm fine with wherever you decide to put it.  Some of Microsoft's games have stored data there in the past, which I find to be utterly asinine.

In principle, though, I know I'm a Windows-only n00b, but I'm more inclined to agree with CP on this one.  I just don't see how having to switch accounts to perform system-critical tasks is anything more than an annoyance.  Like miskat, I'm the only person who uses my computer, and that's the way it'll be until I get rid of the thing (which is hopefully sooner rather than later, but that's another story).  Having a separate Administrator account to do things like install programs or change certain settings just seems needlessly inefficient.  For instance, my family has Norton Internet Security (and yes, I know how vile a piece of software it is, but at least it does what they need it to do), and I have my brother, myself, and my parents set up as administrators, in case we need to tweak it to perform a certain function.  I know I'm probably violating at least ten statutes of safe computing in doing so (especially in that I don't have them password-protected...at least I managed to do that on my own machine), but sometimes you can't fight convenience.  As far as I'm concerned, if I make a change to a system file that screws everything up, then I was fooling around with something I shouldn't have been with my current level of knowledge, and I deserve the consequences.

[CP5670]

The problem is that Microsoft has always been behind the times here.  OS X users made the switch easily (OS9 and below didn't do the same thing btw), but Microsoft has babied it's users too much and now most of them just don't know any better.  Modern OSes are just too complicated to run the with the old DOS mentality of security.  You can't just protect your computer from outside forces now, you need to protect it from yourself too.  Doing otherwise is just stupid at this point.  ... Not that I mind it too much though, I make up to $1500 a day fixing stuff like that for other people.

Well, as I described earlier, I have gotten along just fine for the last several years by not protecting anything from myself, so it can't be all that "stupid." (besides, it can't exactly be protection when you can still go into the administrator account and mess with things as you please)

Now that I think about it though, since this is a post-3.6.9 thing, it would be at least several months away and my campaign should be finished by then, so this would be less of an issue for me at that point. (the main reason I need to transport the files around is to update my progress and test files with that)

So long as you don't throw the data in a folder in My Documents, I'm fine with wherever you decide to put it.  Some of Microsoft's games have stored data there in the past, which I find to be utterly asinine.

I have at least 10 games that store their stuff in there. It's a fairly common location, unfortunately.

[Huggybaby]

I understand now. How dare a dumbass plebe like me profess to know what I want? I'm glad there are programmers who know better what's good for me. WHEW! What a relief! I feel so safe now!

[taylor]

I understand now. How dare a dumbass plebe like me profess to know what I want? I'm glad there are programmers who know better what's good for me. WHEW! What a relief! I feel so safe now!

It's not what you want, or even what we want, it's simply how the OSes are designed now.  And we have to keep up with it all so that the game will still be working in another 5 years.  I mean, if you don't want to have the %APPDATA% thing, then stop using newer builds.  No one here is going to stop you from that.  It will be next summer at the earliest before the switch is made anyway.

If you have a problem with it then complain to Microsoft, not us.

[karajorma]

Now that I think about it though, since this is a post-3.6.9 thing, it would be at least several months away and my campaign should be finished by then, so this would be less of an issue for me at that point. (the main reason I need to transport the files around is to update my progress and test files with that)

Bear in mind that the only thing that would have to be in %appdata% are the pilot files. You can simply carry on using the main folder for everything else.

[Huggybaby]

Don't get me wrong taylor, my comments are in no way directed to anyone here, I'm just grousing about the situation at large. I fully realize there's nothing you can do about it.

Peace,

Huggybaby

[Nuke]

if only youre registry settings are bing stored in this file i really dont see a big deal with it. i too have the old dos mentality, hell ive been uisng it a long time. but the settings beign sotred are basic system specific stuff. if you move the game from one computer to another your gonna wanna go through those settings again and set them up for that machine. it may have a different video card or a different native res on the monitor or a different refresh. as for pilot files i really dont care, my pilot has been an ensign for the past 4 years. every time a new build comes out i clone it and toss the original anyway, just to keep my controls config and make sure i dont have any pilot related problems.

i have an aversion twards putting actual data files in my windows docs and settings folder, and perfer to keep them on a seprate drive partition. though this is more a problem with how windows uses those directories than anything else. theres only a couple programs that store settings in that folder that i give a damn about, photoshop being one of them. so when its time to do the os wipe (and with windows you gotta do this ) its easy to copy the few settings i want to keep over to the data prtition beofe running a format on that drive. problem with windows is that of programs dont all follow the same set of rules, while for linux you dont have much of a choice if you want your program to run. there are some brains behind the linux way, i just hope microsoft watches and learns.