How to prevent Stata from creating "Stata" folder on launch

[Cangyuan Li]

Hi all,

I have not managed to find any information relating to this in the documentation or online. Every time I launch Stata, it creates an empty folder named "Stata" in my Documents (/Users/cangyuanli/Documents). It doesn't seem to do anything but annoy me. I am using Stata17 BE on Mac (Big Sur), but it happened as well with Stata16 and previous OS. Is there any way to tell Stata to stop doing this? Admittedly it isn't a big deal; it just bugs me.

Thanks so much!

[Richard Williams]

Is it actually creating a folder, or is it just starting from a folder that already exists? My guess is the latter.

You can put commands in profile.do that are executed every time you start. For example, I have

* Richard Williams' profile.do

noisily display ""
noisily display "Date & Time: $S_DATE $S_TIME"
noisily display ""

If you really really really are creating a folder every time you start Stata, see if profile.do creates it.

[Richard Williams]

One other theory: When you installed Stata, you may have told it to put files in a folder called Stata. If you are always deleting that folder, maybe Stata recreates it.

If you are always deleting it, I would just quit doing so.

[Cangyuan Li]

Thank you for the response! I haven't created a profile.do, but maybe I'll create one to delete the folder. Your second theory definitely sounds plausible, although I don't remember what I did when installing.

Edit: I actually just found someone with the exact same question here: https://www.statalist.org/forums/for...default-folder. It also seems here: https://www.stata.com/manuals/gsmb.pdf that this isn't something you can turn off.

[Richard Williams]

Why don't you just let the folder be and not delete it? It isn't doing you any harm, is it?

[Richard Williams]

Or, if you create profile.do and place it where Stata can find it, it sounds like the Stata folder will not be created, based on what William Lisowski said here: https://www.statalist.org/forums/for...default-folder

[Cangyuan Li]

It still gets created if I put the profile.do in one of those specified paths, but I just added a line to remove it on launch, which suffices for me. Thanks again for taking the time to help me with something so minor (and irrelevant).

[Leonardo Guizzetti]

Why don't you just let the folder be and not delete it? It isn't doing you any harm, is it?

I'm reminded of quote attributed to Henry Youngman: “The patient says, "Doctor, it hurts when I do this." The doctor says, "Then don't do that!”

[Justus Stadler]

It still gets created if I put the profile.do in one of those specified paths, but I just added a line to remove it on launch, which suffices for me. Thanks again for taking the time to help me with something so minor (and irrelevant).

@Cangyuan Li
I am just getting started with Stata and have the same problem.
It's not the biggest issue, but i like my order structure in Documents to be neatly arranged and would love to find out, how you can prevent this process.
Could you explain how you solved it? I checked the other links you submitted but can't find a solution there or anywhere else online.