Starting with the 0.21.0 release, the 'User Data' (POPFile configuration data, corpus, magnets, message history, etc) does not need to be stored in the same folder as the POPFile program. The installer assumes each user will have completely separate 'User Data' when it defines the POPFILE_ROOT and POPFILE_USER environment variables.

This diagnostic utility makes it easy to find where the Windows installer or 'Add POPFile User' wizard has stored the 'User Data' for the current user. The utility uses data from the registry and the new POPFile environment variables to find the user data.

1. pfidiag
2. pfidiag /simple
3. pfidiag /full
4. pfidiag /shortcut
5. pfidiag /menu
6. pfidiag /help

Commands 1 and 2 in the list are equivalent and produce a simple report while command 3 produces a more detailed report which may help in debugging strange or unexpected behaviour. Command 4 creates a Start Menu shortcut to the 'User Data' folder. Command 5, only available in v0.3.0 or later of the utility, displays a menu to make it easy to select the required action. The final command displays a list of the available commands.

The Windows installer for 0.22.0 (or later) creates some Start Menu entries for this utility:

? Start –> Programs –> POPFile –> Support –> PFI Diagnostic utility (simple) ! (runs pfidiag /simple)

? Start –> Programs –> POPFile –> Support –> PFI Diagnostic utility (full) ! (runs pfidiag /full)

? Start –> Programs –> POPFile –> Support –> Create 'User Data' shortcut ! (only available in 0.22.1 or later - runs pfidiag /shortcut)

The installer and 'Add POPFile User' wizard normally use the short file name (SFN) format when setting the POPFILE_ROOT and POPFILE_USER values.

If the environment variables exist, the report indicates if the popfile.pl and popfile.cfg files exist in these locations (as a simple validity check).

On Windows 9x systems it is quite normal for the two environment variables to appear as “><” in the report. This is because the 'runpopfile' program creates the necessary environment variables every time it is used to start POPFile (thus avoiding the system reboot which is normally used to change the value of environment variables on Windows 9x systems).

The PFI Diagnostic Utility was first shipped with the Windows version of POPFile 0.22.0. It can also be downloaded separately (62 KB zip file).