Location of International Preferences files

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Level 6

13,707 points

Location of International Preferences files

System Preferences has an International preference pane which lets you set options like the operating system language, the keyboard layout, and the format for dates and numbers.

I am trying to find the name of and location of the preference file that contains the users choice for date and number formats and therefore contains the settings made using this International preference pane.

Does anyone know this?

For your information, what I want to do is then make a copy of this in /System/Library/User Template/English.lproj so as to automatically set certain preferred options for our new users.

I have already done this successfully for various other settings but I can't work out which file is needed for this one.

PowerBook G4, Mac OS X (10.4.9)

Posted on Apr 20, 2007 10:53 AM

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Answer 1

Josh123

Level 1

7 points

Apr 20, 2007 1:09 PM in response to John Lockwood

It's ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.systempreferences.plist

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Answer 2

biovizier

Level 5

7,937 points

Apr 20, 2007 1:34 PM in response to John Lockwood

The main language and locale settings are stored in the invisible ".GlobalPreferences.plist" file in each user's "~/Library/Preferences" folder. I think some number format settings are in there as well. The input methods available in an account (if this is what you mean by keyboard layout) is specified in the HIToolbox preference file in "~/Library/Preferences/ByHost", but I'm not sure about the setting that determines which one is active...

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Answer 3

John Lockwood Author

Level 6

13,707 points

Apr 21, 2007 3:03 AM in response to John Lockwood

Thank you for your replies, I had not spotted the invisible .GlobalPreferences.plist but had already looked at com.apple.systempreferences.plist

Both these seem to contain the list of languages defined for the user in International Preferences, and also the sort order and the keyboard choice.

However I could not see an option which defined the choice of International date and money formats, which is the one I am particularly looking for.

Any further ideas?

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Answer 4

Klaus1

Level 9

52,915 points

Apr 21, 2007 4:57 AM in response to John Lockwood

You must have missed it!

System Preferences ~ International ~ Format

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Answer 5

Apr 21, 2007 6:04 AM in response to John Lockwood

John

If you are looking for how to set this via the GUI then Klaus has answered you. But if you are looking at the preference files, then these "key"s, in the "~/Library/Preferences/.GlobalPreferences.plist", are relevant to you:

AppleICUDateFormatStrings
AppleICUDateTimeSymbols ("am/pm")
AppleICUTimeFormatStrings
AppleLocale ("en_GB")
NSCurrencySymbol ("<C2><A3> " for "£")
NSNegativeCurrencyFormatString
NSPositiveCurrencyFormatString
NSThousandsSeparator
NSTimeFormatString (obsolete, I think)

By the way, there is no default for this file in "/System/Library/User Template/English.lproj/Library". Also you will need root privileges to put one there.

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Answer 6

John Lockwood Author

Level 6

13,707 points

Apr 23, 2007 3:19 PM in response to Michael Conniff

John

If you are looking for how to set this via the GUI
then Klaus has answered you. But if you are looking
at the preference files, then these "key"s, in the
"~/Library/Preferences/.GlobalPreferences.plist", are
relevant to you:
AppleICUDateFormatStrings
AppleICUDateTimeSymbols ("am/pm")
AppleICUTimeFormatStrings
AppleLocale ("en_GB")
NSCurrencySymbol ("<C2><A3> " for "£")
NSNegativeCurrencyFormatString
NSPositiveCurrencyFormatString
NSThousandsSeparator
NSTimeFormatString (obsolete, I think)

By the way,
there is no default for this file in
"/System/Library/User
Template/English.lproj/Library". Also you will need
root privileges to put one there.

Thanks, this looks like what I was looking for, I would plan to set it up in a user account and then copy the file to the template directory for use by new accounts.

Note: the same principal can also be used as a template for network logins via a server as well as local accounts.

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