Here is my problem: In our installation, we have separated the data and pub directories from the rest of the TWiki installation for reasons of backup and revision control:

• The TWiki installation is under revision control (CVS in our case) and not backed up as part of our daily backup as the CVS repository is.
• The data and pub directories are not under revision control, as they are already revision controlling themselves but they are backed up daily.

What causes a problem with this scheme is the dual nature of the pub directory: It is use

• to hold the attachements and images related to a topic, and
• to hold some images and files used in the installation itself (e.g., the twiki icons, the icn directory, the Plugins directory).

In order to support our backup and revision control strategy, we had to implement a complicated scheme of keeping two superimposed pub directories around.

My recommendation would be to make separate above two functions of the pub directory:

1. Move the files that are part of the TWiki system itself (the icons, the icn directory, and the Plugins directory) into a different directory, e.g., twiki/images.
2. Use the pub directory purely for attachments and the like
3. Add a variable referencing the new "images" (or whatever) directory.

-- ThomasWeigert - 12 May 2002