Whenever a user enters "~" as an argument, my program replaces it with System.getProperty("user.home").
After debugging, I see that this replaces "~" with "C:UsersSoulBeaver" and not "C:/Users/SoulBeaver".
Going through previous questions about incorrect user.home folders, I found out that Java tries to fetch the path from
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Folders\
However, I'm using Windows 8 and there is seemingly nothing wrong:
At this point I'm assuming Java "eats" the backslash... so how do I prevent that from happening?
Update
Since the code was requested, here it is. This is taken from Allen Holub's Solving Java's Configuration Problem
/**
* For every enum element in the array, treat keys[i].name() as a key
* and load the associated value from the following places (in order):
*
* <ol>
* <li>a -D command-line switch (in System properties)</li>
* <li>if no -D value found, an environment variable with the same name as the key</li>
* <li>if no environment found, the default stored in the Enum element itself</li>
* </ol>
*
* That value must identify an existing directory in the file system, and a
* File representing that location can be retrieved from {@link #directory(Enum)}.
*
* @param keys The values() array associated with the enum that's using this class.
* @throws IllegalStateException if a given key doesn't have a value associated with it
* or if that value doesn't identify an existing directory.
*/
public LocationsSupport(T[] keys) throws IllegalStateException {
StringBuilder logMessage = new StringBuilder("Loaded environment/-D properties:\n");
try {
for (T element : keys) {
String how = "???";
String key = element.name();
String value;
if ((value = System.getProperty(key)) != null)
how = "from system property (-D)";
else if ((value = System.getenv(key)) != null)
how = "from environment";
else if ((value = element.defaultValue()) != null)
how = "from default. Mapped from: " + value;
if (value != null)
value = value.replaceAll("~", System.getProperty("user.home"));
if (value == null || value.isEmpty())
throw new IllegalStateException("Value for " +key +" cannot be null or empty.");
File location = new File(value);
createLocationIfNecessary(location, element.createIfNecessary());
if (!location.isDirectory())
throw new IllegalStateException("Location specified in "
+key
+" (" +asString(location) +") "
+"does not exist or is not a directory.");
dictionary.put(key, location);
logMessage.append("\t");
logMessage.append(key);
logMessage.append("=");
logMessage.append(asString(location) );
logMessage.append(" (");
logMessage.append(how);
logMessage.append(")\n");
}
} finally {
if (log.getAllAppenders() instanceof NullEnumeration)
System.err.println(logMessage);
else
log.info(logMessage);
}
}
It's failing at trying to locate the default location for CONFIG:
public enum Places implements Locations {
CONFIG ("~/config"),
HOME ("~"),
TMP ("~/tmp", true),
TERM_STORE ("~/tmp/indices/term_store/", true),
RESOURCE_STORE ("~/tmp/indices/resource_store/", true),
PERSON_STORE ("~/tmp/indices/person_store/", true);
I am using Java 1.7.0_13 and IntelliJ IDEA 12.1.3