Export settings and Import settings was introduced with UltraEdit for Windows v11.20. It is very easy to use because of the user has just to select an (empty) folder on export and a folder with exported settings on import. UltraEdit itself determines which files to copy from directory of currently used INI file to the selected folder on export and which settings respectively configuration files to import from selected folder. Which files are copied to selected folder on export and which files are read and imported into current configuration on import from selected folder depends on currently used version of UltraEdit.

Backup/restore user customization was introduced with UltraEdit for Windows v12.10. It gives the user full control over which configuration files in directory of currently used INI file and its subdirectories are archived in a backup container file and which configuration files are restored from a backup container file. So with Backup/restore user customization it is also possible to backup files like syntax highlighting wordfiles, template files, theme files, script and macro files on being stored in directory of currently used INI file or a subdirectory, etc. But the user needs to know what to backup and what to restore.

Both features are not designed to backup/export configuration files/settings of version X and restore/import configuration files/settings of version Y although this could work also depending on UltraEdit versions. The UltraEdit version used for backup/export should be the same as used on restore/import. Both features can be used to move configuration files of one UltraEdit version from one computer to another computer with same UltraEdit version. The user account can be even different although the default application data directory containing usually most configuration files contains the user's profile directory name in path which usually differs on using different account names. So UltraEdit has to automatically update some paths in the INI file on importing/restoring settings on export/backup made on a different computer with a different %APPDATA% directory path.

The files in export folder are just copies of the original files and therefore can be opened in UltraEdit for viewing them and even edited on knowing what you are doing. The *.uec container file created on backup of a user's configurations contains binary data and should not be edited in UltraEdit. But the data of the configuration files are not stored compressed or encrypted in the container file and therefore can be viewed in UltraEdit after opening the *.uec file in UltraEdit and switching from hex edit mode to normal text editing mode. However, no modification should be made on the *.uec file as this corrupts the data and then the backup cannot be used further to restore configuration files from it.

The find and replace favorites are stored in INI file in the sections: [FindFavorites], [FindFavoritesTitles], [ReplaceFavorites], [ReplaceFavoritesTitles]. They are restored/imported on being backed up/exported before, i.e. the export/import folder respectively the container file contains the INI file with these sections. So if you are missing some find/replace favorites, I recommend searching for these sections in the files in export folder respectively in *.uec file and recreate the find/replace favorites with the found strings in those four sections. Otherwise you have lost your favorites because of your export/backup does not contain them.

By the way: Windows itself creates so called shadow copies of files like *.ini files. You can perhaps restore an UltraEdit INI file containing the find/replace favorites you are missing from such a shadow copy. Please read the articles which can be found in world wide web on how to find shadow copies of a file and restore them if there are indeed shadow copies of UltraEdit INI file available. And Windows creates also copies of *.ini files (anywhere stored on a drive) also if system restore is enabled for that drive which is one reason why I enable this Windows feature always although not enabled by default anymore since Windows 8. So it could be also possible to restore an UltraEdit INI file by accessing hidden system directory System Volume Information (after making it readable for the current user by changing the NTFS permissions because of by default only system account can access it) and searching in ASCII (UE < v24.00) or in UTF-16 (UE ≥ v24.00) in this directory and all its subdirectories for *.ini files containing for example [FindFavorites] (ASCII or UTF-16 encoded).