home dir in cygwin

Bill Sconce sconce at in-spec-inc.com
Thu Feb 6 14:34:12 EST 2003


On Thu, 06 Feb 2003 13:56:07 -0500
Bruce Dawson <jbd at codemeta.com> wrote:

> > How does one go about specifying an alternate home directory in Cygwin? 
> >    Right now, ~ == / and I'd rather it be /cygdrive/d/User\ Profiles/eprice
> 
> export HOME="/cygdrive/d/User Profiles/eprice"
> 
> The above establishes your home directory - there really is no
> "alternate home" directory in Unix (that I'm aware of).


I concur.  "~" is your home directory in Cygwin, and it can be anywhere
you say.  It certainly doesn't have to be "/" - and probably shouldn't be.
(I don't recognize "alternate home" either.)

I've been using Cygwin heavily for the last two years, and I believe Bruce's
suggestion is correct - export HOME=... should do it.    Unfortunately, I
can't actually test this for you today.  My shop runs only Linux, and you
have to have Microsoft to be running Cygwin.  :)

(Which my client does, of course.  HEAVY duty NT shop.)  Cygwin has been
an absolute lifesaver.  Once you allow for a few differences that cannot
be avoided, it's almost as good as having a real operating system again.

Bill




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