Sharing Prism in a lab

Prism stores the list of user-defined equations, choices from the Preferences dialogs, the list of recently used files, and more in a configuration file.

Prism Windows stores preferences in the file Prism5.cfg. Prism Mac stores preferences in a file named “Prism4 Preferences”. The location of these files depends on which version of Windows or the Mac OS you use, so search for them.

If several people use the same computer, each may maintain their own preferences and equations. To do this, create a different shortcut icon for each user. In the target portion of the properties dialog for the shortcut, enter the full path name of the Prism program followed by “-O” (letter O, not zero) and then the full name of the configuration file you want to use. If the file doesn't exist, Prism will create it. For example:

C:\Program Files\PRISM5\PRISM.EXE -OC:\JERRYS\JSPRISM.CNF

If you are running a network license, you may place the Prism4.cfg file into the program folder on the shared (server) drive. When Prism is first used on a new computer, it will use the settings in this shared configuration file. Changes will be saved on the individual user’s hard drive. This means that all users can begin with the same settings, but then customize them.