If you are manually backing up or restoring a system, or setting a new system and want to mirror your settings from one Aperture setup to another, there are a few files you can easily copy from one system to another.

Copying Preferences/Settings

NOTE: In Mac OS X Lion and above, to access the ~/Library folder, hold down the Option key while clicking the Go menu in the Finder, and you will see Library listed.

Here are the files you need:

~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.Aperture.plist — This is your basic Aperture preferences file. It’s also the first one to trash if your settings have gone wonky in Aperture.

~/Library/Application Support/Aperture/ — Everything else from Aperture is in this folder. This includes your adjustment presets, export presets, file naming presets, metadata presets, and on and on.

~/Library/Application Support/(other plug-ins, usually by name)/ — If you have any third-party plugins installed (such as by Nik Software), look for settings here.

~/Library/Containers/com.apple.Aperture/ — With the introduction of “sandboxing”, a lot of files have moved into a structure inside the Containers folder. You will find aliases (icons that have a curved arrow on them) to just about everything, just remember if you find a .plist or any other file that could be worth trashing, pay attention to where it is; is it actually in that Containers folder, or is it just aliased to somewhere else in the system?

~/Library/Containers/com.apple.Aperture/Data/Library/Caches/com.apple.Aperture — Following on the above, this is where you'll now find the cache files for Aperture.

Exporting/Importing Settings

Many settings can be exported and imported without having to dig through your Library. For example if you go to the menu Aperture > Commands > Customize then click on the gear menu, you’ll see Export and Import options. This lets you export your customized keyboard shortcuts and import them on another system. The same goes for the keywords under Window > Show Keywords HUD. If you follow the copy steps above, all of these will be included, but for simpler setup without completely overwriting existing settings, look for those export/import options.