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Glossary
User data directory
A user data directory is the folder where Chromium keeps one browser's cookies, logins, site storage and settings.
What the folder holds
Cookies, saved logins, site storage, extension state and preferences all sit under one path. The browser writes them as you work and reads them back at the next start.
It also fills with caches, which are large and mean nothing. Any site you visit again writes its own back within seconds.
Cookies and logins
The part that keeps an account signed in and the part a warmed profile is worth money for.
Site storage
Local storage, databases and worker state, kept apart for each site the browser has seen.
Settings and extensions
Preferences and the extensions installed into this browser and no other.
Caches
Hundreds of megabytes that carry nothing and that sites will simply write again.
One folder for each profile
Every profile is handed its own folder on the launch line, so two profiles never share a cookie jar. All of them sit inside the folder the app keeps its own data in.
You can open that folder yourself: ~/Library/Application Support/@armanos/desktop on macOS, %APPDATA%\@armanos\desktop on Windows, ~/.config/@armanos/desktop on Linux.
Its own path
The folder is named after the profile, so two of them cannot land on each other.
Owner only on disk
Permissions are narrowed at every launch, so another account on this computer cannot read the cookie database.
One browser at a time
A second browser on the same folder either will not start or disturbs the session already open there.
Why the self-test takes an empty folder
A read only measurement must not touch the session you have open, and a second browser on that folder would do exactly that.
So the check starts on a fresh empty folder and carries the profile's identity on the launch line instead. The seed decides what the browser answers, not the directory.
The same launch line
The measurement is built by the code a real launch uses, so it cannot drift away from it.
Nothing of yours is read
The empty folder has no cookies and no logins, and the open session is left alone.
Swept afterwards
Old folders left behind by an interrupted run are removed, because tens of megabytes each fill a disk.
What travels when a profile moves
A profile moves to another computer as one encrypted file: its settings plus the contents of its folder, minus the caches, the worker state and the files that belong to a single run.
The profile identity travels with it. The fingerprint is derived from that identity, so the account meets the same machine on the other computer.
| What | Travels | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Cookies and logins | Có | this is what a warmed profile is |
| Local storage and databases | Có | sites read them as well as the cookies |
| Caches and worker state | – | large, and the site sets them up again itself |
| Lock and port files | – | they belong to one run on one machine |
| The profile identity | Có | without it the other computer is a new machine |
Deletion happens in two steps
Removing a profile stops its browser and puts the profile in the bin, where you can still restore it. Emptying the bin erases its folder with everything inside it.
Its counters, its launch entries and its copy in the shared folder go with it. A name left in a log is a record of a profile you believed was gone.
Often confused with
A profile inside one browser
The picker in an ordinary browser makes folders under one directory, and one process serves them all.
Incognito
A session that writes little and forgets it on close. The folder is still the one the window that opened it uses.
The folder the app itself keeps
It holds the profiles, the settings and the downloaded engine, and it is the parent of all of this.
What this does not do
- Separate folders do not separate machines. Two profiles on one computer still leave from one address unless each has its own exit.
- The folder is not a vault. The browser seals its cookie database with a fixed key so a profile stays portable, and the real protection is who can read the folder.
- Moving a folder does not move an account's history. What a site already knows about a login travels with the account and not with the file.
- Deleting it does not undo a link that already exists. Two accounts opened from one profile stay linked after the folder is gone.
Check it
Each line above is a file you can open or a stand that keeps it honest.
- Each profile launches with its own folder narrowed to its owner
- apps/desktop/src/lib/forkEngine.js
- A transfer carries the session and skips the caches
- apps/desktop/src/lib/bundle.js · apps/desktop/test/profile-bundle.js
- Emptying the bin leaves nothing behind it
- apps/desktop/test/delete-leaves-nothing.js
- Measurement folders do not pile up on the disk
- apps/desktop/test/probe-dirs-swept.js
Questions
- Can two profiles share one folder?
- They must not. One folder is one identity, and a second browser on it either will not start or writes over the session already open.
- Can I just copy the folder to another machine?
- Use the transfer file instead. It carries the same contents plus the profile identity, and it is sealed with a password you choose.
- Do caches travel with a profile?
- No, and that is deliberate. They are large, sites refill them on their own, and they hold nothing that keeps an account signed in.
- Who else on my computer can read it?
- Nobody with a different account on the same machine. The folder is narrowed to its owner at every launch, including folders made earlier.
- Is the fingerprint stored in the folder?
- No. It is derived from the profile identity each time and arrives on the launch line, so there is nothing on disk to copy or to lose.
Give every account a folder of its own
A profile takes its folder, its seed and its exit address with it, and it can move to another computer as one sealed file.