I run Inkscape in Mac OS X 10.5.5 and X11 in XQuartz 2.3.1. Every time I start Inkscape I get an error message about my preferences.xml file being "not valid" or "no read permissions" and no new settings will be saved. I have seen a solution on the net but cannot find the file. Have scanned the Contents folder inside Inkscape.app and showed hidden files but no success. Can anybody give me instructions?

I think it's something like /Users/your_user_name/.inkscape/preferences.xml (but I could well be wrong, as I haven't got a Mac).

Thanks, sas, I have seen that link before but I get confused by the "/.inkscape/" address - what does the dot before inkscape mean? There is no folder with that name, I have really searched every corner of my Mac. So you may well be right but I do not know how to find my way to the preference file. Anybody?

the files and folders that start with a dot are hidden, try under View menu, maybe there's a Show hidden files option there, or right-click inside the window to get the menu, maybe the option is there.

If you can see other files and folders that start with a dot and no .inkscape then you can create it yourself and copy the preferences.xml from the Inkscape official folder.

You made my day, prkos, thank you very much! I finally found the hidden folder and replaced the corrupt preferences.xml file and now everything runs perfectly. The case is closed, full gratitude to you and sas!