special folders

[David Glasgow]

I am attempting to make a rev project Vista compatible.  The main  
problem is determining where special folders are, and what they are  
best used for.  I want to store a stack which will hold assessment  
results for all users.  Thus there must be no permissions problems  
for any level of user to read from or write to this file.

Problems with OSX and specialfolderpath have been reported for a  
while on 2.9, and I am afraid it still gives me an 'execution error'  
using 3.0 on OSX both in IDE and application, whilst the same stack  
works fine as a standalone in XP.  A bit disappointing, but since the  
problem I am trying to fix is on Windows, not a disaster.

So, on Windows, I had expected to use the vanilla rev  
specialfolderpath syntax, but it seems to me I may need to use  
CDISLs, or can I just test that absolute paths to the appropriate  
folder exist as expected?

I had hoped to use C:documents and settings\all users\documents but  
this doesn't exist on Vista.

I can see that for XP most program data is stored in C:documents and  
settings\all users\application data

In Vista, this exists as a virtualised folder/shortcut which  
redirects to C:programdata

Neither directory is listed on the specialfolderpath page in the Rev  
guide.   For some users these folders are hidden, but I have tested  
read write privileges and that seems to be OK for ordinary users and  
even guests, whether or not the folder is visible.   Am I on the  
right lines with respect to the location?  Am I OK to use the XP form  
and rely on the Vista folder virtualisation, or do I need to write  
separate routines for the two OSs, and use CDISL numbers?

Alternatively, is there a better location for assessment results to  
be read from/written to?  I looked at the new 'public' folder in  
Vista, but it seems that by default this isn't public (or at least  
not on the machine I investigated), and has very confusing permissions.

Finally, what is the syntax for the CDISL version of specialfolder?   
I can't see an example, and using Rev Studio on Mac means it is very  
difficult to experiment.

OH, just had another thought.  I was exploring Vista Business.  Will  
this sort of thing vary in the other versions?

Thanks

David Glasgow