Xdg.Net

A .NET Standard library for the XDG Base Directory Specification and XDG user directories.

Xdg.Net is a small (the .dll is only 11 KB), fast and portable (Completely supports .NET Standard 2.0 and even NativeAOT!) .NET implementation of the XDG Base Directory Specification and XDG user directories for Windows, MacOS and Linux/FreeBSD.

Installation

Use NuGet to install Xdg.Directories.

From the .NET CLI:

dotnet add package Xdg.Directories

or from Visual Studio's package manager:

Install-Package Xdg.Directories

Usage

Base Directories, C#

using System;
using Xdg.Directories;

// Prints /home/$USER/.local/share
Console.Writeline(BaseDirectory.DataHome);

// Prints /home/$USER/.cache
Console.Writeline(BaseDirectory.CacheHome)

User Directories, F#

open Xdg.Directories

// Prints /home/$USER/Documents
printfn "%s" UserDirectory.DesktopDir

Default Locations

If any of the respective XDG environment are specified, the variable will always be returned. Otherwise, the value depends on the operating system.

Inspiration is taken from the Go implementation for Windows and MacOS directories.

Base Directory

Environment Variable	Windows	macOS	Linux/FreeBSD
XDG_DATA_HOME	%LOCALAPPDATA%	$HOME/Library/Application Support	$HOME/.local/share
XDG_CONFIG_HOME	%LOCALAPPDATA%	$HOME/Library/Application Support	$HOME/.config
XDG_STATE_HOME	%LOCALAPPDATA%	$HOME/Library/Application Support	$HOME/.local/state
XDG_BIN_HOME	null	null	$HOME/.local/bin
XDG_DATA_DIRS	%APPDATA%:%PROGRAMDATA%	/Library/Application Support	/usr/local/share:/usr/share
XDG_CONFIG_DIRS	%LOCALAPPDATA%	$HOME/Library/Preferences:/Library/Application Support:/Library/Preferences	/etc/xdg
XDG_CACHE_HOME	%LOCALAPPDATA%	$HOME/Library/Application Support	$HOME/.config
XDG_RUNTIME_HOME	%LOCALAPPDATA%	$HOME/Library/Application Support	/run/user/$UID

User Directory

User directories on Windows use Known Folders.

Environment Variable	Windows	macOS	Linux/FreeBSD
XDG_DESKTOP_DIR	Desktop	$HOME/Desktop	$HOME/Desktop
XDG_DOWNLOAD_DIR	null	$HOME/Downloads	$HOME/Downloads
XDG_DOCUMENTS_DIR	My Documents	$HOME/Documents	$HOME/Documents
XDG_MUSIC_DIR	My Music	$HOME/Music	$HOME/Music
XDG_PICTURES_DIRS	My Pictures	$HOME/Pictures	$HOME/Pictures
XDG_VIDEOS_DIR	My Videos	$HOME/Movies	$HOME/Videos
XDG_TEMPLATES_DIR	Templates	$HOME/Templates	$HOME/Templates
XDG_PUBLICSHARE_DIR	%PUBLIC%	$HOME/Public	$HOME/Public

Extra Directories

	Windows	macOS	Linux/FreeBSD
Home	%USERPROFILE%	$HOME	$HOME

Packaging

Stable releases are available on NuGet, and preview releases are uploaded to both GitHub packages (need GitHub account to download) and Gitea packages (no login required).

dotnet add package Xdg.Directories

Native Library (WIP)

View the README here

License

MIT