System Directories

In this documentation we refer to a few different directories that Gaia Sky uses to store data and configuration settings: $GS_DATA, $GS_CONFIG, and $GS_CACHE.

  • $GS_DATA — contains some essential files and directories for Gaia Sky to run properly. For example:

    • $GS_DATA/camera — storage point for camera path and keyframe files.

    • $GS_DATA/frames — default save location for the frame output mode.

    • $GS_DATA/screenshots — default save location for screenshots.

    • $GS_DATA/crashreports — whenever Gaia Sky crashes, a crash report is stored at this location.

    • $GS_DATA/log — contains the full Gaia Sky log of the last session. Only the last session’s log is kept.

    • $GS_DATA/data — also referred to as simply $data, this is the default dataset save location. All datasets are stored in this location by default (can be changed from the dataset manager).

  • $GS_CONFIG — contains the configuration files, the bookmarks, and the keyboard mappings file.

  • $GS_CACHE — contains cached files, like Wikipedia images.

The locations of $GS_DATA, $GS_CONFIG and $GS_CACHE depend on the operating system:

  • Linux — as of Gaia Sky 2.2.0, the Linux release of Gaia Sky uses the XDG base directory specification.

    • $GS_DATA = ~/.local/share/gaiasky/

    • $GS_CONFIG = ~/.config/gaiasky/

    • $GS_CACHE = ~/.cache/gaiasky/

  • Windows and macOS — the .gaiasky directory in the user home directory for both locations, so:

    • $GS_DATA = $GS_CONFIG = [User.Home]/.gaiasky/

    • [User.Home] on Windows is typically in C:\Users\[username].

    • [User.Home] on macOS is typically in /Users/[username].

    • $GS_CONFIG = $GS_DATA

    • $GS_CACHE = $GS_DATA/cache

Datasets location

By default, Gaia Sky stores the downloaded datasets in the $GS_DATA/data directory. The location where the datasets are saved is referred to as $data. The actual location of $data is stored in the configuration file (key data::location) and can be changed in the dataset manager window at startup.

  • $data = $GS_DATA/data

Logs and crash reports

For every Gaia Sky session a system log is stored in the directory $GS_DATA/log. Logs are overwritten with each new session, so only the last log is effectively available at any given time.

  • $GS_DATA/log/gaiasky_log_lastsession.txt — full log of the last Gaia Sky session.

Crash reports are stored in $GS_DATA/crashreports whenever Gaia Sky crashes. If that happens, please, create a new issue in https://codeberg.org/gaiasky/gaiasky/issues, and attach the crash report. Additionally, also attach the session log.

  • $GS_DATA/crashreports/gaiasky_crash_[$DATE].txt — crash reports.