Technical Document #1010

Subject: Application Preferences in the Registry

Product: All Digital Formation Products

Last Updated: February 7, 2005

Overview

This document describes the registry settings locations, and a couple of suggestions on fixing or changing common problems.

Details

All registry settings are stored at the following location:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Digital Formation\App Name

There is a tree structure beneath this node with various groupings for the application preferences. If any of these nodes are removed or renamed, the application will attempt to reestablish the default preferences the next time the application is loaded.

Common Solutions

Q.    My preferences are screwed up, how can I use the defaults?

A.    There are two possible solutions (note both these techniques will lose all other application preferences):

In the main BIN folder for the application (e.g. C:\Program Files\LESA\BIN\), you will find a .REG file which contains the default settings for the application (e.g. LESA.REG). If you double-click on this file in Windows Explorer, this default set will be put into the registry, replacing any existing preferences.

If the first technique does not solve the problem, it's possible there is other information in the registry that is conflicting with the application, and must be removed entirely. To do so, launch the Registry Editor from the Start | Run command (REGEDIT). Note: Modifying the registry without knowledge of the consequences can be extremely dangerous, and can even destroy the entire operating system. Do so with extreme caution!!!. From the Registry Editor, locate the application preference node at the address (HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Digital Formation\App Name). With this node selected, press the Delete key to remove the application preferences. Close the Registry Editor and restart the application - a default set of preferences will be reloaded.

Q.    I have a network server installation, and I need to update the server end preferences used by the clients. I've updated the server end .REG file, but how do I get the client machines to load it?

A.    This is accomplished by manually loading the new .REG file on each client machine, in a manner similar to that described in step #1 in the previous entry. The only difference is that you will not use the .REG file on a local machine, since that won't exist. You will need to locate the .REG file from the server installation (e.g. \\Server\Program Files\LESA\BIN\NLAK\). As above, if there is a catastrophic problem with the local registry settings, you may need to perform step #2 above as well. This will automatically cause the client to reload the server preferences on reload as well.

Conclusions

In the event that an error message occurs that is not listed here, or the solution presented here does not solve the problem, please contact Digital Formation, Inc. Technical Support (Support@DigitalFormation.com). When contacting us, please provide the following:

Your Name
Company (if applicable)
Digital Formation Product being used, and complete version number
Complete message text, and error codes if displayed
Operating System
Location where product has been extracted, and where you are trying to install
Any other details you think may be important, or solutions you have attempted