User Data Location

Helix QAC stores user settings, sample projects, default files, and help in the User Data Location (UDL). These are copied from the Helix QAC installation on first use, allowing the user to customize to their preference and/or environment.

By default, the UDL is stored on a per user basis and most users can accept the default, platform specific locations:

  • Windows: %LOCALAPPDATA%\Perforce\Helix-QAC-<version>
  • Linux: $HOME/.config/Perforce/Helix-QAC-<version>

<version> is replaced by the version of the release. This is typically the year and release number for that year - for example "2022.2".

It is possible to change the location of the UDL (again on a per user basis) or configure in a common location so that the settings are installation wide.

UDL Discovery

The following methods are polled on startup in turn to determine where the UDL is located:

  1. The environment variable HELIX_QAC_UDL is checked and if not empty that location will be used as the UDL.
  2. The following user-specific location is checked (for a file named Helix-QAC-<version>.udl) and if present then the content of that file will point to the UDL. The file is platform specific:

    3. Windows: %LOCALAPPDATA%\Perforce\Helix-QAC-<version>.udl

    Linux: $HOME/.config/Perforce/Helix-QAC-<version>.udl

  3. The following system-specific location is checked (for a file named Helix-QAC-<version>.udl) and if present then the content of that file will point to the UDL. The file is platform specific:

    4. Windows: %PROGRAMDATA%\Perforce\Helix-QAC-<version>.udl

    Linux: /etc/Perforce.d/Helix-QAC-<version>.udl

If you want to override the default UDL locations, you can set a different user-specific location in the CLI (qacli config udl) or in the GUI (see The Admin Menu).

If you want a system wide UDL then either set the environment variable HELIX_QAC_UDL appropriately or use the following CLI command:

qacli config udl --global --set /home/bob/udl
The UDL location must be available in the filesystem and permissions set appropriately so that the user can read/write/delete to that location.
If you set a system specific UDL you need to ensure that the directories (%PROGRAMDATA%\Perforce or /etc/Perforce.d) have been created and permissions set appropriately – those directories are NOT automatically created during installation.