Commonly-used/needed Installation locations?

[mickyhulse]

Hello,

I am trying to document/determine all of the most up-to-date locations/directories for all commonly-used Illustrator installation directories.

Here's my list so far (minus plugins/extensions):

• /Applications/Adobe Illustrator CC 2017/Presets.localized/en_US/Actions
• /Applications/Adobe Illustrator CC 2017/Presets.localized/en_US/Brushes
• /Applications/Adobe Illustrator CC 2017/Presets.localized/en_US/Charts
• /Applications/Adobe Illustrator CC 2017/Presets.localized/en_US/Graphic Styles
• /Applications/Adobe Illustrator CC 2017/Presets.localized/en_US/Keyboard Shortcuts
• /Applications/Adobe Illustrator CC 2017/Presets.localized/en_US/Scripts
• /Applications/Adobe Illustrator CC 2017/Presets.localized/en_US/Swatches
• /Applications/Adobe Illustrator CC 2017/Presets.localized/en_US/Symbols
• /Applications/Adobe Illustrator CC 2017/Presets.localized/en_US/Workspaces
• /Applications/Adobe Illustrator CC 2017/Cool Extras.localized/en_US/Templates
• /Applications/Adobe Illustrator CC 2017/Support Files/New Document Profiles

Am I missing any directories?

When you go to modify Illustrator, are there any locations, not on the above list, that you drop files/folders into?

Really, I just want to confirm that in the latest version of Illustrator, that all customizable directories are located in Presets.localized (on a Mac).

Thanks!

[mickyhulse]

Looks like for Photoshop, the recommended location for presets is in the user's home directory:

~/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Adobe Photoshop CC 2017/Presets

Though, not Scripts. Apparently that goes into the Application's preset directory.

Looks like the same is true for Illustrator (Scripts in the app folder).

Though, what about:

/Applications/Adobe Illustrator CC 2017/Cool Extras.localized/en_US/Templates

Looks like that's the only location for custom templates?

I think those are good examples as two why I asked this question in first place. Stuff has always seemed to be spread out over the OS for when it comes to customizations.

I'd love to see or create an official list of what goes where.

[mickyhulse]

Ok, here's my master list of most-to-moderately common directories …

Adobe Illustrator 21/CC 2017:

~/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Adobe Illustrator 21/en_US/

• Swatches
• Symbols
• Plug-ins
• New Document Profiles
• Graphic Styles
• Brushes

/Applications/Adobe Illustrator CC 2017/Presets.localized/en_US/

• Actions
• Charts
• Keyboard Shortcuts
• Scripts
• Workspaces

/Applications/Adobe Illustrator CC 2017/Cool Extras.localized/en_US/

• Templates

/Applications/Adobe Illustrator CC 2017/Support Files/Resources/en_US/Arrowheads.ai

/Applications/Adobe Illustrator CC 2017/Support Files/Resources/en_US/Bevels.ai

… See anything that I'm missing?

[mickyhulse]

Looks like there could be some potentially interesting stuff located here:

~/Library/Preferences/Adobe Illustrator 21 Settings/en_US/

Just posting here for future reference.

[mickyhulse]

Not sure if anyone else will find this helpful, but I wrote a macOS nodejs script to help me automate the symlinking of folders which can be found here:

GitHub - mhulse/slinky-cli: Reverse Symlink CLI

It's not perfect, but gets the job done for me. Use at your own risk!

[CypherPoet]

Just coming to this issue now, but Adobe Illustrator CC 2022 still appears to feature this confusing degree of separation.

I've taken to saving as much as I can in /Applications/Adobe Illustrator CC 2022/Presets.localized/en_US/. My main concern, though, is that whatever I place here won't eventually get deleted when I update to a new version -- and that I can have things preserved when I manually import/export settings.