# Startup Basics¶

This guide applies to command-line application users. Decrediton users can safely ignore the use of config files - Decrediton handles basic configuration automatically. It is also worth noting that some of our guides show configuration file settings and other guides show startup command flags.

## Configuration File Locations¶

All of the Decred software, when started, reads from a configuration file to determine which settings it should enable/disable/set during that initial load. All of the command line startup flags (e.g. dcrwallet --testnet) can be replaced by settings within the appropriate configuration file (e.g. dcrwallet --testnet could be replaced by testnet=1 in dcrwallet.conf).

These configuration files are located within the application home directory of the application. The location of these default home directories for Windows, macOS, and Linux are listed below:

OS dcrd, dcrwallet, dcrctl App Directories
Windows %LOCALAPPDATA%\Dcrd\
%LOCALAPPDATA%\Dcrwallet\
%LOCALAPPDATA%\Dcrctl\
macOS ~/Library/Application Support/Dcrd/
~/Library/Application Support/Dcrwallet/
~/Library/Application Support/Dcrctl/
Linux ~/.dcrd/
~/.dcrwallet/
~/.dcrctl/

Each of these folders is allowed its own .conf file, named after the individual application (e.g. dcrd uses dcrd.conf). Please also note that the Dcrd and Dcrwallet home directories are automatically created when each application is first launched. You will have to manually create a Dcrctl home directory to utilize a config file.

The dcrinstall installation method automatically creates configuration files, with the minimum configuration settings already enabled.

The Manual Installation method includes sample configuration files within the .zip/.tar.gz. It is recommended to copy these config files into the appropriate directory described above, and rename them to remove ‘sample-‘. These files have many settings commented out (comments are not read by the program during runtime) so all of these settings are effectively disabled. You can enable these pre-written settings by simply deleting the semi-colon before the line.

## Startup Command Flags¶

A majority of the settings you are able to set via the configuration file can also be passed to the application as parameters during launch. For example, the following OS-specific commands would open dcrd for Testnet use, an alternative to using testnet=1 in your config file:

Windows: dcrd.exe --testnet
macOS: ./dcrd --testnet
Linux: ./dcrd --testnet


The above example would first look to the dcrd configuration file for settings and then look to the executable command to enable the testnet setting.