Program Files

Program Files is the directory name of a standard folder in Microsoft Windows operating systems in which applications that are not part of the operating system are conventionally installed. Typically, each application installed under the 'Program Files' directory will have a subdirectory for its application-specific resources. Shared resources, for example resources used by multiple applications from one company, are typically stored in the ' Common Files ' directory.

Program Files is the directory name of a standard folder in Microsoft Windows operating systems in which applications that are not part of the operating system are conventionally installed. Typically, each application installed under the 'Program Files' directory will have a subdirectory for its application-specific resources. Shared resources, for example resources used by multiple applications from one company, are typically stored in the ' Common Files ' directory. ==Location== In a standard Windows installation, the 'Program Files' directory will be at %SystemDrive%\Program Files (or the localized equivalent thereof), and the 'Common Files' (or the localized equivalent thereof) will be a subdirectory under 'Program Files'. In Windows Vista and later, the paths to the 'Program Files' and 'Common Files' directories are not localized (translated) on disk. Instead, the localized names are NTFS junction points to the non-localized locations. Additionally, the Windows shell localizes the name of the Program Files folder depending on the system's user interface display language. Both 'Program Files' and 'Common Files' can be moved. At system startup, the actual paths to 'Program Files' and 'Common Files' are loaded from the Windows registry, where they are stored in the ProgramFilesDir and CommonFilesDir values under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion . They are then made accessible to the rest of the system via the volatile environment variables %ProgramFiles% , and %CommonProgramFiles% . Applications can also obtain the locations of these paths by querying the Setup API using dirids , or through Windows Management Instrumentation, or by querying the shell using CSIDLs, or ShellSpecialFolderConstants . These are all localization-independent methods. x86-64 and IA-64 versions of Windows have two folders for application files: The Program Files folder serves as the default installation target for 64-bit programs, while the Program Files (x86) folder is the default installation target for 32-bit programs that need WoW64 emulation layer. While 64-bit Windows versions also have a %ProgramFiles(x86)% environment variable, the dirids and CSIDLs are not different between 32-bit and 64-bit environments; the APIs merely return different results, depending on whether the calling process is emulated or not. To be backwards compatible with the 8.3 limitations of the old File Allocation Table filenames, the names 'Program Files', 'Program Files (x86)' and 'Common Program Files' are shortened by the system to progra~N and common~N , where N is a digit, a sequence number that on a clean install will be 1 (or 1 and 2 when both 'Program Files' and 'Program Files (x86)' are present). ==See also== WinFS File system Directory (computing) 64-bit computing ==References== ==Further reading== ==External links== microsoft.com, Microsoft does not support changing the location of the Program Files folder by modifying the ProgramFilesDir registry value microsoft.com, Why is the Program Files directory called Program Files instead of just Programs? The Windows system folders - General overview. superuser.com, How can I find the short path of a Windows directory/file? helpdeskgeek.com, Why Does Windows 7 64-bit Need Two Program Files Folders?

Text derived from https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1364155113 under CC BY-SA 4.0; modifications have been made.