GNU Astronomy Utilities manual

4.2.3 Current directory and User wide

For the current (local) and user-wide directories, the configuration files are stored in the hidden sub-directories named ./.gnuastro/ and HOME/.local/etc/ respectively. Unless you have changed it, the HOME environment variable should point to your home directory. You can check it by running $ echo $HOME. Each time you run any of the programs in Gnuastro, this environment variable is read and placed in the above address. So if you suddenly see that your home configuration files are not being read, probably you (or some other program) has changed the value of this environment variable.

Although it might cause confusions like above, this dependence on the HOME environment variable enables you to temporarily use a different directory as your home directory. This can come in handy in complicated situations. To set the user or current directory configuration files based on your command line input, you can use the --setdirconf or --setusrconf, see Operating modes

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GNU Astronomy Utilities manual, November 2015.