Environment variables

Suran's documentation can use environment variables to reference specific locations on the hard drive. This document will explain common environment variables and how to access them.

LOCALAPPDATA

You may see a reference to a path containing %LOCALAPPDATA%. This references a standard Windows folder called local application data. Our documentation uses this syntax because the path varies based on the current Windows user's username.

For example, the local application data for a user account named mary is C:\Users\mary\appdata\local . But for a user named office, the path would be C:\Users\office\appdata\local.

Using the %LOCALAPPDATA% environment variable allows our documentation to be accurate even with varying user names.

PROGRAMFILES

Another environment variable you'll see in Suran's documentation is %PROGRAMFILES%. This usually refers to C:\Program Files  but could vary based on the Window boot drive. However, this is an extremely rate configuration.

Accessing folders via environment variable

1. Click the Windows start button or press the Windows key
2. Type in the environment variable, i.e. %LOCALAPPDATA%  (exactly as written, case-sensitive, no spaces)
3. Press Enter
4. The user's local application data folder will open in Windows Explorer.