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I have a DVD+-RW drive that has quit working. Apparently many users of this laptop model experience the same problem under windows and are required to edit the registry to correct the problem. So where should I look to make a similar edit?

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    You are more likely to get an answer if you edit your post with information regarding precisely what the Windows registry change was (and, if you know, what the effect of the change is).
    – Steven D
    Oct 11, 2010 at 22:51
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    Also, Super User would be a better venue, since it has people who know hardware and people who know Windows, both of which could help figure out how to transpose the Windows fix.
    – Gilles 'SO- stop being evil'
    Oct 11, 2010 at 23:16
  • @Steven D I started a discussion at meta about this. I'm opposed to editing it on principle, since one A has already recieved so many votes. meta.unix.stackexchange.com/questions/201/…
    – ixtmixilix
    Oct 14, 2010 at 0:52
  • Very similar I have found one is dconf Editor. dconf-tools ![Install dconf-tools](apps.ubuntu.com/cat/applications/dconf-tools). It also store the settings of interfaces and applications as windows registry do. Have a look on it for your specific problem.
    – vusan
    Apr 8, 2016 at 6:32

2 Answers 2

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Thankfully, there is no Linux equivalent of the Windows registry. Configuration is kept in (mostly) text files:

  • The system configuration is in text files under /etc.
  • The system state, which in Windows ends up mixed with configuration data, lives under /var.
  • User configuration and state lives in “dot files”, i.e., files and directories whose name begins with a . in your home directory.

You can't simply transpose a registry edit to a configuration in another operating system: registry edits are completely Windows-specific. You'll have to understand what the registry edit is doing and transpose it to Linux. It's likely that you'll end up modifying a file under /etc, but there are too many potential candidates to list here (also, it might depend on your distribution).

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    Wow, this seems not to answer the question at all, and yet it has fourteen upvotes.
    – delete
    Oct 13, 2010 at 15:42
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    Well the problem is that there are two very different questions here. This answer very clearly answers the question posed in the title, but the body of the question implies that "the Linux equivalent of the Windows registry" isn't what the poster is really after.
    – andrewsomething
    Oct 13, 2010 at 17:22
  • this is what I thought to be the case upon asking the question. I suppose it's a deeper question as to where those files are exactly.
    – ixtmixilix
    Nov 2, 2010 at 19:27
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    The first word "thankfully" helped gain my upvote. ;)
    – Wildcard
    Apr 8, 2016 at 6:46
  • @Gilles, The var philosophy is itself problematic in the age of dynamic scripting and hotswapping. It should be called /coresys and /noncoresys
    – Pacerier
    Jul 29, 2017 at 11:01
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The equivalent of the registry on Linux is Elektra but it is not very popular. Most software uses a configuration file located in the /etc directory.

https://www.libelektra.org/

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