I just installed the brand new WinPython64-3.14.3.0slim.exe alongside my older, WinPython64-3.13.7.0slim, and I can't for the life of me get the new version to read spyder's settings from the same location that the old version wrote them to, namely %USERPROFILE%\.spyder-py3.

I had made the old version registered and fixed (i.e. I ran wppm --register and wppm --fix), I undid that now (ran wppm --unregister and wppm --movable) and made the new one registered and fixed, and the registering worked, but the settings are still read from the local WPy64-3.14.3.0\settings directory. The two winpython.ini files under \settings\ are identical except for the new PYTHONIOENCODING line, and I changed nothing in them from the default. Running the new spyder.exe immediately creates the local settings files and such.

I tried changing winpython.ini, both by changing [inactive_environment_common] to [active_environment_common] and by just uncommenting USERPROFILE = %HOME% in the env.bat section (I did not run any batch files manually by the way), both result in Spyder starting as before with the local/portable settings but the iPython console within now throws an error:

Traceback (most recent call last):
File "C:\Users\redacted\Documents\Work\Progs\WPy64‑3.14.3.0\python\Lib\site‑packages\spyder\plugins\ipythonconsole\widgets\main_widget.py", line 1464, in _connect_new_client_to_kernel
kernel_spec.env = future.result()
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
File "C:\Users\redacted\Documents\Work\Progs\WPy64‑3.14.3.0\python\Lib\site‑packages\spyder\plugins\ipythonconsole\utils\kernelspec.py", line 275, in env
env_vars["tmp"] = GetShortPathName(env_vars["tmp"])
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
pywintypes.error: (2, 'GetShortPathNameW', 'The system cannot find the file specified.')

Changing SPYDER_CONFDIR = %HOME%\settings\.spyder-py3 to SPYDER_CONFDIR = %USERPROFILE%\.spyder-py3 did the trick, but why did the older version not require this change?

Speaking of winpython.ini, is this line correct?
## <?> changing this segment to [inactive_environment_common] makes this segment of lines active
Inactive (which is what it is by default) is active?

And while we're on the subject, I don't even understand the USERPROFILE = %HOME% line to begin with, %HOME% does not exist as an environment variable, so what is USERPROFILE being set to?