# How to use PrivateProfileString()
**URL:** https://discourse.processing.org/t/how-to-use-privateprofilestring/17631
**Category:** Libraries
**Created:** [February 8, 2020, 3:23am UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/how-to-use-privateprofilestring/17631 "2020-02-08T03:23:20Z")
**Posts on this page:** 4
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@spflanze](https://discourse.processing.org/u/spflanze)
#### Post date: [February 8, 2020, 3:23am UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/how-to-use-privateprofilestring/17631/1 "2020-02-08T03:23:20Z")
I am attempting to follow the example at:
> **[Processing 2.x and 3.x Forum](https://forum.processing.org/two/discussion/4954/how-to-read-ini-files-in-processing)**
>
> Processing is an electronic sketchbook, a language and a worldwide community. This is its forum.
to store user settings between sketch invocations. I am using the Eclipse IDE to develop it.
In this code snippet:
```auto
/** default starting directory where browsing for an output file to write to will start */
public File fStartingDataFilePath = new File( "C:\\Hotfix\\*.csv" );
/** ini file section for files */
public String sIniSectFile = "Files";
/** ini file key for default ouput data file path */
public String iIniKeyDataFilePath = "DataFilePath";
...
System.PrivateProfileString( sIniFile, sIniSectFile, iIniKeyDataFilePath) = fStartingDataFilePath.getAbsolutePath();
```
I get two errors on the last line above:
```auto
Multiple markers at this line
- The method PrivateProfileString(String, String, String) is undefined for the type
System
- The left-hand side of an assignment must be a variable
```
The second error is easy for me to understand because I have never before seen a function, or method, call set equal to something. Yet that is what that example does.
The first error means my version of the System class does not have the PrivateProfileString method. What do I need to import to have this?
What is the right way to do this?
---
### Author:  [@bucherjo](https://discourse.processing.org/u/bucherjo)
#### Post date: [February 8, 2020, 8:29am UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/how-to-use-privateprofilestring/17631/2 "2020-02-08T08:29:14Z")
Hello spflanze
Could you show us the code in the example that you used?
Otherwise you could try it with a java library for editing .ini files. One such library would be:
[http://ini4j.sourceforge.net/](http://ini4j.sourceforge.net/)
---
### Author:  [@spflanze](https://discourse.processing.org/u/spflanze)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2020, 10:38pm UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/how-to-use-privateprofilestring/17631/3 "2020-02-10T22:38:02Z")
Thanks for this ini4j. I have decided to use it. The download gave me two libraries:
```auto
ini4j-0.5.4.jar
ini4j-0.5.4-jdk14.jar
```
I do not know which to use. Under what circumstance is each one to be used?
---
### Author:  [@jeremydouglass](https://discourse.processing.org/u/jeremydouglass)
#### Post date: [February 16, 2020, 5:08pm UTC](https://discourse.processing.org/t/how-to-use-privateprofilestring/17631/4 "2020-02-16T17:08:34Z")
@Chrisir is the one who posted that code snippet you linked from 2014 – but I believe that is VBA (Visual Basic for Applications) code, not Processing!