I had been running Kodi 18.7 Leia with no problems. Upgraded to v. 19 and Kodi would not completely restart after being shut down. I uninstalled it (completely, including C:\Users\Me\AppData\Roaming\Kodi\) and reinstalled v19. Same problem. It worked one time and then, after exiting the program and trying to restart it, it loaded up to the point that it appeared as a thumbnail in the taskbar and would not finish loading. It appeared to be showing a dialog box but it was impossible to read or respond to it. I had to shut it down with the Windows task manager. After a few more trials, including several system reboots, I uninstalled and reinstalled v19. Same behavior. It ran right after installation and then refused to restart. No addons added.
So I downloaded v. 18.9 and installed it. Same behavior. I uninstalled, rebooted, downloaded 18.7 Leia and reinstalled it. Same behavior. Neither Leia nor Matrix will load.
Kodi 19
Windows 10.0.19041 Build 19041
Intel® Core™ i5-3330 CPU @ 3.00GHz, 3001 Mhz, 4 Core(s), 4 Logical Processor(s)
RAM 8.00 GB
Display Adapter NVIDIA GeForce GT 730
Malwarebytes 4.3.0
Windows Defender Firewall (Kodi is allowed to communicate through the firewall)
https://paste.kodi.tv/gerasewehi.kodi
Upgrading Kodi may have altered some settings in Kodi's profile folder.
Rename that folder and start Kodi again so it can create one with new settings.
The same applies when downgrading.
(2021-03-06, 09:22)Klojum Wrote: [ -> ]Upgrading Kodi may have altered some settings in Kodi's profile folder.
Rename that folder and start Kodi again so it can create one with new settings.
The same applies when downgrading.
I assumed that you didn't mean %APPDATA%\Kodi\userdata (C:\Users\Me\AppData\Roaming\Kodi), since I had deleted it every time I uninstalled Kodi. I renamed C:\Program Files\Kodi\userdata (apparently the master profile) and the program started. Thanks. So I changed a setting and added an addon and exited the program. It started normally.
I am puzzled that Kodi didn't recreate the Program Files userdata folder and didn't seem to need it. Is it just a template for new user profiles?
There should not be any folder under program files other than the executables.
What may have happened is you specified a portable install (running Kodi with the -p flag set in the command line of the icon/shortcut) but used the default location for storage. That does store all of the Kodi settings in the specified folder (basically the Kodi folder that normally lives in appdata ends up as a sub-folder of the install folder) but c:\program files is not a good place at all for it (indeed we explicitly do not recommend it in our
portable mode (wiki) notes on the wiki) as it needs admin privs to write to that folder.
(2021-03-06, 18:08)vorpalcom Wrote: [ -> ]I assumed that you didn't mean %APPDATA%\
Yep, that one. I can't instantly know which add-on setting(s) you changed, but Kodi is not particularly good at backward compatibility.
(2021-03-06, 18:08)vorpalcom Wrote: [ -> ]I am puzzled that Kodi didn't recreate the Program Files userdata folder and didn't seem to need it. Is it just a template for new user profiles?
You'll have to rename/delete the entire profile folder, not just userdata. Otherwise strange things can happen.
Kodi will initiate a new set of profile settings, just as if you install the application for the very first time.
(2021-03-06, 18:18)DarrenHill Wrote: [ -> ]There should not be any folder under program files other than the executables.
What may have happened is you specified a portable install (running Kodi with the -p flag set in the command line of the icon/shortcut) but used the default location for storage. That does store all of the Kodi settings in the specified folder (basically the Kodi folder that normally lives in appdata ends up as a sub-folder of the install folder) but c:\program files is not a good place at all for it (indeed we explicitly do not recommend it in our portable mode (wiki) notes on the wiki) as it needs admin privs to write to that folder.
The Program Files/Kodi folder contains EXEs, DLLs, a couple of JAR files, AppxManifest.xml as well as sub-folders: "addons", "media", "system" and "userdata". I was able to run Kodi after renaming "userdata". I haven't used any flags while running or installing Kodi. Note that I have been doing full uninstalls prior to the installations (with the exception of the inital upgrade from 18.7 to 19) and I visually verified that the Program Files/Kodi folder and the Roaming profile folder had been deleted.
(2021-03-06, 18:22)Klojum Wrote: [ -> ] (2021-03-06, 18:08)vorpalcom Wrote: [ -> ]I assumed that you didn't mean %APPDATA%\
Yep, that one. I can't instantly know which add-on setting(s) you changed, but Kodi is not particularly good at backward compatibility.
(2021-03-06, 18:08)vorpalcom Wrote: [ -> ]I am puzzled that Kodi didn't recreate the Program Files userdata folder and didn't seem to need it. Is it just a template for new user profiles?
You'll have to rename/delete the entire profile folder, not just userdata. Otherwise strange things can happen.
Kodi will initiate a new set of profile settings, just as if you install the application for the very first time.
I had been doing full uninstalls followed by fresh installs. The only time I renamed a userdata folder was at your suggestion. I renamed the folder in the wrong location but it still worked. DarrenHill tells me that the folder shouldn't exist in the Program Files/Kodi folder. I have renamed the Roaming/Kodi folder (and of course Kodi recreated it the next time I started it) but Kodi was already working after I renamed the Program Files/Kodi/userdata folder. Everything seems to be working but do you think I should reinstall Kodi one more time for good luck?
I've just got home and been able to check on my PC, and I also have those folders in program files/kodi. It looks like they're created during install for some reason, but are not then otherwise used, at least judging by the date modified info on them.
The files you should be looking at as the active place where things are stored is the folder in %appdata% as already mentioned above, at least unless you've used a
portable mode (wiki) installation.
I think what you're seeing in the program files folder is the underlying system stuff for things like keymaps and Python. Basically it's not really there for user changes and settings, those are in the appdata folder and settings made there should override anything in the sytem stuff anyway.