[wobbly]

I know kodi works from AppData\Roaming\Kodi

so how to setup 2 100% separate setups of Kodi

so addons, skins .. the works are all separate
something like this

AppData\Roaming\Kodi1
AppData\Roaming\Kodi2
can this be done ?

thx

[michaelddd]

I wonder if this is related to my issue (thread posted today in this forum). My wife and I each have an account/profile on the HTPC. I installed Kodi under my login; works great. When I run Kodi logged in as her, I cannot see "Movies" in the menu bar. I tried a lot of things, including Googling it, but I'm a Kodi noob.

[wobbly]

I have looked at profiles but from what i can tell all profiles use the same addons

this would fix everything
AppData\Roaming\Kodi1
AppData\Roaming\Kodi2

[wobbly]

i did find this in profiles.xml
<directory pathversion="1">special://masterprofile/</directory>

[wobbly]

or is there a way to tell kodi,exe the working parth ?

[Koying]

You can run Kodi.exe with the "-p" switch (=portable).
Then, userdata is located in a "portable" (iirc) folder inside the Kodi installation folder.

EDIT: There is also an environment variable, but I don't remember the name. A wiki search will surely tell you

[wobbly]

thank you .. i also found this Portable-launcher-for-Kodi

http:////github.com/nidunc/Portable-launcher-for-Kodi[/code]
may help someone out

[trogggy]

Just use portable builds as Koying suggested. You can have as many as you like, they work when you change profiles @michaelddd) and everything is contained in 1 folder. I haven't used anything else on windows for years. The portable launcher linked to looks like a clever solution to a not very common situation. If you just want multiple builds on a pc it's introducing extra unnecessary complexity.

[michaelddd]

Just use portable builds as Koying suggested. You can have as many as you like, they work when you change profiles @michaelddd) and everything is contained in 1 folder. I haven't used anything else on windows for years. The portable launcher linked to looks like a clever solution to a not very common situation. If you just want multiple builds on a pc it's introducing extra unnecessary complexity.

Thanks very much, @trogggy. I will give that a shot.

[scott967]

I have about a dozen different versions on a single Win 7 system. Just install each to its own folder by editing the default install location the installer suggests. In the windows installer, you can uncheck the VC runtime if you've run it once before (saves a little time in the install). Don't allow the installer to copy or otherwise use/remove the previous version data (either XBMC or KODI). Don't start Kodi from the installer, instead create a shortcut and edit the properties to add the -p switch to the command line target. Now using your new shortcut start Kodi and let it do its thing. Exit Kodi and in win file explorer if you go to the location where you installed the new (portable) Kodi, you will find a created subfolder portable_data. You just copy everything from your previous Kodi install appdata\roaming or another portable install. Now when you restart your new portable Kodi (again always using the shortcut you create) all your addons, settings, databases should be there. If you copy across versions (example 14 to 15) you will have to wait for databases to get updated, and might have some addons fail for not meeting dependencies. You might want to nuke your guisettings.xml sources.xml and databases if things seem hay-wire and rebuild your settings and libraries.

Once you do this once or twice it becomes second nature. You can install nightlies, test builds, DS player, whatever and keep your "production" Kodi clean.

scott s.
.

[michaelddd]

Very helpful! Thanks very much.

I have about a dozen different versions on a single Win 7 system. Just install each to its own folder by editing the default install location the installer suggests. In the windows installer, you can uncheck the VC runtime if you've run it once before (saves a little time in the install). Don't allow the installer to copy or otherwise use/remove the previous version data (either XBMC or KODI). Don't start Kodi from the installer, instead create a shortcut and edit the properties to add the -p switch to the command line target. Now using your new shortcut start Kodi and let it do its thing. Exit Kodi and in win file explorer if you go to the location where you installed the new (portable) Kodi, you will find a created subfolder portable_data. You just copy everything from your previous Kodi install appdata\roaming or another portable install. Now when you restart your new portable Kodi (again always using the shortcut you create) all your addons, settings, databases should be there. If you copy across versions (example 14 to 15) you will have to wait for databases to get updated, and might have some addons fail for not meeting dependencies. You might want to nuke your guisettings.xml sources.xml and databases if things seem hay-wire and rebuild your settings and libraries.

Once you do this once or twice it becomes second nature. You can install nightlies, test builds, DS player, whatever and keep your "production" Kodi clean.

scott s.
.

[donbrew]

I have about a dozen different versions on a single Win 7 system. Just install each to its own folder by editing the default install location the installer suggests. In the windows installer, you can uncheck the VC runtime if you've run it once before (saves a little time in the install). Don't allow the installer to copy or otherwise use/remove the previous version data (either XBMC or KODI). Don't start Kodi from the installer, instead create a shortcut and edit the properties to add the -p switch to the command line target. Now using your new shortcut start Kodi and let it do its thing. Exit Kodi and in win file explorer if you go to the location where you installed the new (portable) Kodi, you will find a created subfolder portable_data. You just copy everything from your previous Kodi install appdata\roaming or another portable install. Now when you restart your new portable Kodi (again always using the shortcut you create) all your addons, settings, databases should be there. If you copy across versions (example 14 to 15) you will have to wait for databases to get updated, and might have some addons fail for not meeting dependencies. You might want to nuke your guisettings.xml sources.xml and databases if things seem hay-wire and rebuild your settings and libraries.

Once you do this once or twice it becomes second nature. You can install nightlies, test builds, DS player, whatever and keep your "production" Kodi clean.

scott s.
.

This method does not seem to work in Windows10; you can't put the -p in the command line target.

However, you can install a second version into a NEW directory (like c:/Program Files/kodi17/) then make that kodi.exe into a desktop shortcut. Clicking that shortcut will run the new version with all of your old addons etc. But you can only run one at a time.

At the moment I have Kodi 16.1 in the as a taskbar shortcut and Kodi 17 alpha as a desktop shortcut. They both use the same /appdata/roaming files.

If you run one and minimize it the other shortcut will maximize that one instead of starting a new program.

[jjd-uk]

Strange as I have multiple different Kodi installs on my Win 10 desktop all using the -p switch in command line target.

[Martijn]

you need to create a new shortcut yourself as you can't use the one created by windows

[DaveBlake]

You also need to install kodi somewhere other than program files to get portable to work. With -p the userdata folder is created under the same folder as the executable, and Win10 won't let Kodi update anything in program files while running.

Also worth adding to Scott's instructions that when copying userdata from one version of Kodi to another you need to delete any *.fi files. These are cache and file structure may have changed between versions causing odd behaviour.