[Win32] Markers can not be defined in "user settings directory"

[rockstar1707]

As the title already says on Windows (tested in Win XP) the directory "c:\Documents and Settings\User\Application Data\Inkscape\markers\" basically has no effect. If I *move* file markers.svg from the installation directory to user settings directory, I have no markers predefined in Inkscape at all.

In my opinion this is useful for custom user settings.

[su_v (suv-lp)]

Duplicate of Bug #171373 “Save change to markers.svg user accessible”?
(The issue is not specific or limited to the Windows port)

[su_v (suv-lp)]

Linking as duplicate to bug #171373 - please add a comment here and revert the duplicate status if you don't agree and think these are different feature requests.

[rockstar1707 (rockstar1707-gmail)]

I believe that both "bugs" (or feature requests) want to achieve the same thing, i.e. that the user can define his own set of markers, which would be available even when one installs new version of Inkscape. However, as it seams to me, Inkscape already has the infrastructure to offer functionality, but it obviously doesn't work (yet). Namely, when you install Inkscape it creates directory "$HOME\Application Data\Inkscape\" (on Windows XP ), where (by default) you have the following folders/files:
[extensions]
[icons]
[keys]
[palettes]
[templates]
preferences.xml

So, I put my custom templates in folder [templates] and I see them in Inkscape even after I install new version. The same holds extensions etc. So, to me it would seam obvious that the place for custom markers would be "here" in folder [markers].

Anyway, when I posted this bug report I thought that Inkscape already has this functionality. Namely, I thought that Inkscape first reads such settings from folder "c:\Program Files\Inkscape\share\" (Windows XP) and after that from folder "$HOME\Application Data\Inkscape\". So I simply created subfolder [markers] in folder "$HOME\Application Data\Inkscape\" and I put my custom markers there and I thought that these will be available in Inkscape. As I have figured out till now, Inkscape basically still doesn't have this functionality. So, it really might be more appropriate to set this bug as a duplicate of the above mentioned bug.

One question still remains, though. Should be markers from this "custom" location added to the default markers, or they should simply override them. I would vote for overriding. The reason for such decision is the following. From my personal point of view, which is of course specific to every single person, most of markers in Inkscape are not really useful and there are simply too many of them, which makes me hard to find the one that I want to use. And I think I use only few different markers, say 5. Hence, the users who would use this functionality would be most probably "smart" enough to choose those "few useful" markers from Inkscape's default set and they would add them to their own set, which would be located in this "custom" location. This would assure they would always have only the markers they are actually using. However, unfortunately this also means that if Inkscape ever changes the set of its default markers, these users most probably wouldn't be even aware of them :-/

Anyway, please note that the solution mentioned above is only my personal point of view.