jEdit stores all settings, macros, sessions and so on as files inside its settings directory. In most cases, editing these files is not necessary, since graphical tools and commands can do the job. However, being familiar with the structure of the settings directory still comes in handy in certain situations, for example when you want to copy jEdit settings between computers.
The location of the settings directory is system-specific; to find out what it is, look in the activity log (see the section called The Activity Log in Chapter 3) for a message like the following:
[message] jEdit: Settings directory is /home/slava/.jedit |
If you would like jEdit to store its settings in a different directory, you can specify the -settings switch on the command line. For example, the following will instruct jEdit to store all settings in the jedit subdirectory of the C: drive:
C:\jedit> jedit -settings=C:\jedit |
The -nosettings switch will force jEdit to not look for or create a settings directory.
By default, jEdit creates the following files inside the settings directory; plugins may add more:
abbrevs - a plain text file which stores all defined abbreviations
history - a plain text file which stores history lists, used by history text fields and the Edit>Paste Previous command. See the section called History Text Fields in Chapter 7 and the section called The Clipboard in Chapter 3
jars - a directory where plugins can be installed; see Chapter 9
macros - a directory where macros can be stored; see the section called Macros in Chapter 4
mode-cache - a binary file which stores information about all available edit modes so that they can be loaded on demand. See Chapter 5
modes - a directory where edit modes can be stored; see Chapter 5
PluginManager.backup - when the plugin manager is asked to update or remove a plugin, it doesn't actually delete it from disk; instead, it is moved to this directory. It may be worthwhile to empty out its contents occasionally. See Chapter 9 for information about the plugin manager
PluginManager.download - this directory is usually empty. It only contains files while the plugin manager is downloading a plugin. See Chapter 9 for information about the plugin manager
properties - a plain text file where the bulk of jEdit's settings are stored
server - a plain text file that only exists while the edit server is running. The port number and authorization key is stored here. See Appendix B
sessions - a directory where saved sessions can be stored; see the section called Saving and Loading Sessions in Chapter 4