Modifying Global Libraries manually

Don't modify it while IDEA is still running...

Hi all,

I need to write a perl program to modify the global libraries
manually. Basically, it will modify the file:
IntelliJ\config\options\applicationLibraries.xml to add/remove some
jar files. But the problem I am facing is that, even though I modify
this file, whenever IntelliJ is restarted, it overwrites this with the
old version somehow. It looks like it is caching this file somewhere,
and during the restarts, removes all the modifications.

Is there a way to prevent this from happening and keep the changes
that were made? Do I need to delete something from IntelliJs cache
directory?

Thanks...

Actually, I am not...

I close IntelliJ, modify this, then restart it, but still, it somehow grabs it from somewhere...

I am having the same problem with IDEA 2021.3.

I exit IDEA, update the file, restart IDEA. As soon as I open a project, it rewrites the file.

I think I figured out the answer. It seems that IDEA restores the file if it discovers the file has bad contents.

If the file has correct contents, it leaves it alone.