I installed the program in my “F” Drive, its installed in folder, “WPSystem”. The sub folders mimic everything installed on my “C” drive under “AppData”. First question is why if I specified the install directory did it also install on “C” which I reserve only for the OS and productivity programs? My second is concerning third party addons, which community folder do I use, the one on “C” or “F” drive?
If you installed to F:, then the folder under AppData should be a shortcut to the F: one. I think just the Microsoft Store version does that though? I have the Steam version and I just have an empty Packages folder under my “C:\Users\buffy\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft Flight Simulator”. 
I have the MS Store version.
The folder on the C drive are just links to the folders on the F drive.
So when a file in folder C:/foo is accessed, Windows redirects that file access to folder F:/foo, where the file is actually stored.
So if you delete (the real) file F:/foo/blah.txt, it will disappear in C:/foo too.
Which means, there is no duplicate install, it just looks as if.
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This may be since under the installed apps it shows it on F, but when I check the size of the “Packages” folder on “C” it is over 100G, so its more then just links.
Where exactly are you finding this “filled” Packages folder on C:?
Try this:
- create an empty text file ‘msfs2020_test.txt’
- copy it into your community folder on drive F
- look for it in your community folder on drive C
- open the one on C, write something into the file and save it
- check the file on drive F
“C:\Users[YOUR_USER_NAME]\AppData\Local\Packages\Microsoft.FlightSimulator_8wekyb3d8bbwe\LocalCache\Packages\Community
During installation I specified the “F” drive and this is what it looks like;
F:\WpSystem\S-1-5-21-3913493320-2269129170-420541488-1001\AppData\Local\Packages\Microsoft.FlightSimulator_8wekyb3d8bbwe\LocalCache\Packages\ Community
“C:\Users[YOUR_USER_NAME]\AppData\Local\Packages\Microsoft.FlightSimulator_8wekyb3d8bbwe\LocalCache\Packages\Community
During installation I specified the “F” drive and this is what it looks like;
F:\WpSystem\S-1-5-21-3913493320-2269129170-420541488-1001\AppData\Local\Packages\Microsoft.FlightSimulator_8wekyb3d8bbwe\LocalCache\Packages\ Community
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Okay I’m starting to understand the relationship now. The file showed up on “C” and the text I put in it there showed up on “F”.
Thanks
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Here is more info about these SymLinks :
- https://www.howtogeek.com/howto/16226/complete-guide-to-symbolic-links-symlinks-on-windows-or-linux/
- Symlinks in Windows 10! - Windows Developer Blog
If you list directory contents in a command prompt window with the dir command, it will show which directories are real directories and which are just redirections.
Thanks for all the help