<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=windows-1252"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class="">Preferences generally gets updated more frequently than that. It gets updated whenever you click ‘Save’ in the Preferences dialog. It gets updated whenever you use a file dialog. So, a lot.<div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Though these values are used and preserved via Python, it isn’t being done in a way that is easy to control from an external script. The easiest way, assuming you are willing to edit the source code, is to change line 381 of chimera/tkgui.py in the latest Chimera to add “initialdir=‘wherever-you-want’” to the keywords being given to the _ImportDialog constructor.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">—Eric</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><div><blockquote type="cite" class=""><div class="">On Jun 23, 2016, at 4:43 PM, Dougherty, Matthew T <<a href="mailto:matthewd@bcm.edu" class="">matthewd@bcm.edu</a>> wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><div class=""><div dir="ltr" style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;" class=""><div id="x_divtagdefaultwrapper" style="font-size: 12pt; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;" class=""><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;" class="">So generally, the preference file automatically gets updated at shutdown of chimera?</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;" class=""><br class=""></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;" class=""><span style="color: rgb(33, 33, 33); font-family: wf_segoe-ui_normal, 'Segoe UI', 'Segoe WP', Tahoma, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px;" class="">“Open dialog starts in directory from last session” option in the General preferences category seems to imply there is a variable somewhere that is being maintained.</span><br class=""></div><div style="font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;" class="">what about controlling the variable through python?</div><div style="font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;" class=""><font face="wf_segoe-ui_normal,Segoe UI,Segoe WP,Tahoma,Arial,sans-serif" size="2" color="#212121" class=""><span style="font-size: 15px;" class=""><br class=""></span></font></div><div style="font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;" class=""><font face="wf_segoe-ui_normal,Segoe UI,Segoe WP,Tahoma,Arial,sans-serif" size="2" color="#212121" class=""><span style="font-size: 15px;" class=""><br class=""></span></font></div><div style="font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;" class=""><font face="wf_segoe-ui_normal,Segoe UI,Segoe WP,Tahoma,Arial,sans-serif" size="2" color="#212121" class=""><span style="font-size: 15px;" class="">Not clear on this: </span></font><span style="color: rgb(33, 33, 33); font-family: wf_segoe-ui_normal, 'Segoe UI', 'Segoe WP', Tahoma, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;" class="">miller browser dirHistor</span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;" class=""><br class=""></div><div id="x_Signature" class=""><div id="x_divtagdefaultwrapper" style="font-size: 12pt; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;" class=""><div class="x_BodyFragment"><font size="2" class=""><div class="x_PlainText">Matthew Dougherty<br class="">National Center for Macromolecular Imaging<br class="">Baylor College of Medicine<br class=""><span style="font-size: 13pt; font-family: Calibri;" class="">=================================================</span><br class=""></div><div class="x_PlainText"><span style="font-size: 13pt; font-family: Calibri;" class="">=================================================</span><span style="font-size: 13pt; font-family: Calibri;" class=""><br class=""></span></div></font></div></div></div></div><hr tabindex="-1" style="display: inline-block; width: 635.03125px;" class=""><div id="x_divRplyFwdMsg" dir="ltr" class=""><font face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 11pt;" class=""><b class="">From:</b><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>Elaine Meng <<a href="mailto:meng@cgl.ucsf.edu" class="">meng@cgl.ucsf.edu</a>><br class=""><b class="">Sent:</b><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>Thursday, June 23, 2016 6:29:26 PM<br class=""><b class="">To:</b><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>Dougherty, Matthew T<br class=""><b class="">Cc:</b><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="mailto:chimera-users@cgl.ucsf.edu" class="">chimera-users@cgl.ucsf.edu</a><br class=""><b class="">Subject:</b><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>Re: [Chimera-users] default directory for opening files</font><div class=""> </div></div></div><font size="2" style="font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;" class=""><span style="font-size: 10pt;" class=""><div class="PlainText">Hi Matt,<br class=""><br class="">Well, this is kludgy and only for the brave (which you are), but you could edit your preferences file to make the desired location the first one listed in the miller browser dirHistory. It would be a pain to do it all the time, but you could probably script something semiautomatic. Another approach I’ve taken occasionally to ensure keeping the environment exactly the same is to have a non-writable preferences file, but of course then you can’t save any other preferences either, and there is an annoying message upon startup.<br class=""><br class="">Elaine<br class="">----------<br class="">Elaine C. Meng, Ph.D.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><br class="">UCSF Computer Graphics Lab (Chimera team) and Babbitt Lab<br class="">Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry<br class="">University of California, San Francisco<br class=""><br class=""><br class="">> On Jun 23, 2016, at 4:14 PM, Eric Pettersen <<a href="mailto:pett@cgl.ucsf.edu" class="">pett@cgl.ucsf.edu</a>> wrote:<br class="">><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><br class="">> Hi Matt,<br class="">> There is limited control over where the main File->Open dialog starts. The two options are: the directory you last used (even from the previous session) and the current working directory. This choice is controlled by the “Open dialog starts in directory from last session” option in the General preferences category.<br class="">><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><br class="">> —Eric<br class="">><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><br class="">> Eric Pettersen<br class="">> UCSF Computer Graphics Lab<br class="">><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><br class="">><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><br class="">>> On Jun 23, 2016, at 1:58 PM, Dougherty, Matthew T <<a href="mailto:matthewd@bcm.edu" class="">matthewd@bcm.edu</a>> wrote:<br class="">>><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><br class="">>> Starting chimera without a session file, I would like to use the open pulldown menu.<br class="">>><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><br class="">>> The default directory is at root "/".<br class="">>><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><br class="">>> If I use a 'cd somedirectory' command and open with the gui, it still defaults to the root.<br class="">>><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><br class="">>> Is there a command that will set the open/save directory for the gui?<br class="">>> If not, a way in python?<br class="">>><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><br class="">>> Matthew Dougherty<br class="">>> National Center for Macromolecular Imaging<br class="">>> Baylor College of Medicine<br class=""><br class=""></div></span></font><span style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; display: inline !important;" class=""></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; display: inline !important;" class="">_______________________________________________</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;" class=""><span style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; display: inline !important;" class="">Chimera-users mailing list: <a href="mailto:Chimera-users@cgl.ucsf.edu" class="">Chimera-users@cgl.ucsf.edu</a></span><br style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;" class=""><span style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; float: none; display: inline !important;" class="">Manage subscription: <a href="http://plato.cgl.ucsf.edu/mailman/listinfo/chimera-users" class="">http://plato.cgl.ucsf.edu/mailman/listinfo/chimera-users</a></span></div></blockquote></div><br class=""></div></body></html>