Getting path to users Library folder in OS X

Question

I need to open a NSSavePanel with the users Library folder as destination folder. Normally I would do this by entering ~/Library/ in [NSSavePanel beginSheetForDirectory].

This works fine as long as the application is not sandboxed. For sandboxed applications this will result in the NSSavePanel trying to access a folder inside the applications document "box".

I cannot refer to /Users/username/Library/ as I do not know the users username at runtime. So how do I link to this path in cocoa?

Answer 1

Not sure if this will work on a sandboxed application but this is how I do it right now. This will return /User/TheirUserName

-(NSString *)homeDirectory
{
    return NSHomeDirectory();
}

Answer 2

I'm not sure how sandboxing fits in with this, but you can find the user's library directory using:

NSArray* paths = NSSearchPathForDirectoriesInDomains( NSLibraryDirectory, NSUserDomainMask, YES );

Answer 3

It depends what you are trying to achieve.

• If the behavior is required by your application, then you can request a temporary exception entitlement when submitting the application to the Mac App Store. But sooner or later, you will have to find a solution to remove this exception.
• If you want to access data that were previously stored in the ~/Library/ folder, you can define a migration strategy to move back the data into the sandbox.