Rename original home folder after Set Up

I just set up a brand new Pro in a computer lab. I installed Adobe Master Collection, Final Cut, ProTool, etc. It took days....
I then discovered I had (stupidly) named the original Home Folder incorrectly during set up. Can I rename the Home Folder without screwing up all the software serial numbers and activation codes. I have already changed it to the name I want in the Sharing Preferences but my little house still has the original name. It also wants me to type the original Admin. name. I'm not the only Administrator so this is going to lead to confusion.

There might be some permissions issues with the name change. Unfortunately, I do not recall whether I changed the name of a user home folder or used the migration assistant to transfer things to a different user account, but I wound up having to clean up a lot of permissions problems so be sure to check that out before you turn it over to the intended user.
Good Luck with the Adobe apps. Some of them just do not take kindly to any sort of change.

Similar Messages

I renamed my home folder :( can't get it back to normal

hi, i know there are about a billion topics in this forum about this same thing, but i still cannot get everything back to normal despite reading a lot of them.
a couple of weeks ago i renamed my home folder, which created a whole new set of preferences.
i've done some things since then, but i can't remember every step i've taken so bare with me! maybe you clever people can figure out what i've missed out/done wrong.
i remember that in the users folder i renamed the new (incorrect) folder to Stephen_new, and changed the old (correct) one to Stephen. - this was as instructed to by http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=107854.
I also copied the whole library folder from the home > Stephen > library to the home > library folder, as instructed on step 3 on this website http://www.thexlab.com/faqs/renamehomerecovery.html (i presumed by 'home > library > library they meant home > Stephen > library). This gave me back my bookmarks and stuff.
however, in the home folder there was only library and desktop. now, when i add something to a folder (say movies) through mac hd > users > stephen > movies (or the shortcut on the left of finder) it creates a new movies folder in the home directory, and copies the file there too. i.e. the file is in 2 places.
also on the left of finder the icons for movies etc. have all gone back to blue folder icons.
so basically the problem is before if i wanted to go to documents it would be right in my home folder, but now i have to go mac hd > users > Stephen > documents to get there, or i could make a shortcut on the left of finder.
i'm not sure how to tell which users folder i'm actually using, Stephen or Stephen_new. I'm guessing it's Stephen as new files seem to save there.
i would guess that i need to change my users folder to the name of my home folder icon, but you can't have 2 things the same name in the same folder.
i created a topic at appleinsider.com's forums, which no one replied to. maybe some of the info there could help you figure it out
http://forums.appleinsider.com/showthread.php?t=71584
thank you very much for any help you can give me. if anything is unclear please ask me to explain further.
ibook g4 Mac OS X (10.4.8)

hello again,
i didn't really dare to delete the blue home folders before, just in case everything went wrong, but now i think i have so little space that i can't afford to lose 2.25gb!
one thing that slightly worries me is the fact that the 'proper' library folder (in the home icon) is 2.09gb, whereas the 'wrong' one (from the blue folder forenamesurname) is 2.24gb - this is the one i would be deleting. just seems odd to delete a larger file than the one i presume i'm using.
"Move everything you want to keep out of the blue folders, and then place both of the folders on your desktop. If everything works properly after a few days, delete both folders. If you are asked for your administrator password at any point or if either folder is copied instead of moved when dragged, don't delete that folder."
by 'everything you want to keep', does this include the library folder? 'cause there doesn't seem to be much else, and i'm not sure if deleting the library folder would ruin all my preferences.
i've put both of the folders on the desktop, it didn't ask for the admin password or try to copy them, so i guess that's good news. what kind of things should i be looking out for to act differently?
are the folders not in use now that they are on the desktop?
also if i put them in the trash will they have no effect? i.e. the same as permanently deleting them, so i could put them in the trash as a test.
cheers, stephen.

HT1428 How do I revert settings from renaming the home folder?

*PREFACE* I've read plenty of articles today on why NOT to attempt to rename the home folder.. This was done mistakenly by a friend attempting to help with my wifes macbook air.
While they were able to rename the home folder, upon reboot, all system settings are gone, and she cannot access anything on the macbook air. Basically I need any help on how to go about restoring her air to the point before this incident occured, if that's possible (and I REALLY hope it is!!). We only had one user profile on the air, it was hers and is an admin account. When I try to access files on the HD now I get access denied messages. Based on what I've read, I thought if I could get to system preferences I could attempt to rename it back to the original name, reboot, and things would revert back, but when I click on system preferences, it bounces up, and then the light under it goes out.
I own a time machine, and I have plenty of backup data there, I'm curious though of two things. 1st, how exactly do I go about this process, and 2nd, if I restore it, is it going to restore everything back to how it was before the rename happened, or would I have to do something else?
On a scale of 1-5 in terms of knowledge, I'm about a 3. I'm faily new to Mac computing, but I own several other Mac products. I haven't had to replace my current PC laptop (yet, but its days are VERY numbered), but intend to go Mac from that point on. I hope all of this gives someone smarter than me enough information on what my situation is and hopefully how to solve it! Thanks!!

Problem solved, time capsule worked!

Renaming the Home folder.....

Hi Guys,
How can I rename the home folder? Any idea?
Thanks

Don't let the earlier replies put you off; I've now done just that on two computers following the article referred to by macJack, with no problems whatever.
I did however take the precaution of backing up to an external drive beforehand in case of finger trouble.
Note that when creating the new user, you can use the same password, but the account name will have to be different. For instance if your full account name is John Smith, alter it slightly (to John J Smith for example) to create the new account. You can change it back after all's been checked and the old account deleted.

Corrupted iSync Items after renaming the Home folder

I renamed (successfully) my Home folder thanks to a tutorial I found on Apple.com's Support (http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106824).
But now I have two items in my iSync window that seem still related to the old (original) user.
Here is a screenshot:
http://img276.imageshack.us/img276/3661/picture3kw7.jpg
I'd like to "fix" them or remove them.
Thanks

You should contact Microsoft [umm: good luck with that] and Panic for help with dealing with this issue.
The Panic site says this about removing sync client registration information:
Q: I no longer use Transmit. How can I remove Transmit from my .Mac Sync preferences?
A: Awkwardly, Apple doesn't provide a way to remove these items. But, if you're running Transmit 3.5.1 or newer, type this into Terminal:
~/Library/Application\ Support/Transmit/TransmitSync.app/Contents/MacOS/TransmitSync --unregisterClient
That should remove Transmit from the list.
Aside from offering you that little tidbit, all I can give you is a way to unregister all of your synchronization clients. A future release of the framework or of iSync may include such capabilities, but the present ones do not.

Yosemite install has messed up my home folder after fixing user short name.

I just installed Yosemite 10.10.2 onto a new Mac Pro, replacing 10.9.5. After the installation completed, I allow my iCloud settings the set things up for Mail and my other general account settings. The only issue is that when I changed my short name from timjones to tjones, auto correct changed it to tones (as it has done in this post 2 times). Once I recognized this, I used the normal method for modifying a user account by logging in under another admin account, using ditto to copy the '/Users/tones' folder to '/Users/tjones', selecting the Tim Jones account in Users and Groups and using the Advanced Options to reset the short name to tjones. I then reassigned the home folder to /Users/tjones.
All seemed to go well and when I logged back in as tjones. However, I could no longer set up my preferences for apps nor could I access my mail. I then clicked on the 'tjones' home folder in Finder and was greeted with a dialog that said 'Preparing to duplicate items to "Users"'. It then spun for around 2 minutes and prompted me for my password. I entered it and the dialog changed to 'Duplicating 0 items to "Users"' and it's now been spinning for around 15 minutes.
What is this and am I back at square one and reinstalling (I have good backups...)?

The "Duplication" finished finally and my home folder has now disappeared from the /Users folder in Finder. If I check in a Terminal, there are now 2 folders - 'tjones' which is set to tjones:wheel and 'tjones copy' which is set to tjones:admin. As mentioned, neither is visible in Finder.

Can I rename the Home folder

I recently had my 15" MacBook Pro serviced because of a hard drive failure. It required that the operating system (OSX 10.7.3) be reinstalled. The reinstall was handled by the Best Buy Geek Squad store where I originally purchased the Mac. They named my home folder using only my first name in lower case letters. I would prefer my full name like my previous install. DoI understand correctly that it is NOT possible to rename this folder? Would I have to reinstall Lion and wipe all the data to do this? Or is there a simple way to rename the folder.
Thanks in advance,
Anthony

Depending on whether your files are in that account or not, create a new one or open the Users & Groups pane of System Preferences, unlock it, control-click your account, choose Advanced Options, and change it.
(64837)

Restoring previous home folder after turning off FileVault

HI Folks,
I turned FileVault on a long time ago and because of its size didn't turn it off before upgrading to Leopard. After the upgrade, it became obvious that FileVault had to go--it was occupying essentially the whole hard drive and spotlight didn't work. I searched out some instructions on how to work around FV to make space and found this article: http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1974?viewlocale=en_US.
I followed the instructions to the letter except when I got the part where it says "Copy files from the disk image to your new account," I ran into trouble. Thinking it wasn't that big a deal, telling myself I could solve the issue later, I proceeded to nuke enough files in my original user account to give FV the room it needed to turn off. This included (stupid me) my LIbrary folder. When enough space was created, FV turned off and spotlight now works fine.
I won the battle but lost the war... That's because in Leopard, unlike Tiger (for which the instructions were written), you can't simply "Highlight all items in the sparse disk image and drag them into your new account's home folder." Not allowed.
I have everything safely stored on my handy external drive but other than transferring folder by folder, is there any other way to restore my home folder? Is there some super-secret workaround or is this the cautionary tale to all you other folks out there (like we need to hear it again): don't get impatient and pay attention to which operating system the instructions were written for. Tiger's troubleshooting articles are not interchangeable with Leopard's.
Hope I am saving someone else some grief by airing my tale of woe.
Best wishes,
T

Hi VK
Following the instructions in the link, I made a sparse disk image on an external drive and selected all items in my Home and copied them (by dragging) to the mounted sparse disk image.
Thanks,
t

Importing Home Folder after new hard drive and Lion Update

(Okay, long title.)
Had to replace my hard drive. Was running Tiger.
Backed up my entire Home Folder only, on an external harddrive, before it failed completely.
Hard drive replaced, and then loaded Snow Leopard, updated to latest version, 10.6.8.
Ready now to get Lion.
Questions:
- After I install Lion do I simply use the "Transfer Information to This Mac" feature to bring in my Home folder?
- What about the apps that are duplicated, such as Mail, Safari, iCal, etc. Will that be taken care of on its own?
- What about the iLife apps, GarageBand, iPhoto, etc.? Will I be able to update those to the latest versions?
Thank you.

If the username and password combo is identical, then you'll need to unhide the new hidden user's Library folder, then open both home folders and transfer you're stuff. Do note that you might get you can't do that messages. For those items, move the new ones into a newly created Desktop folder, and then you should be able to copy the Tiger ones. Once done, restart so the copied stuff is put into RAM and is available for your other steps, such as reinstalling the apps.

How do rename the Home Folder

Someone else set up my iMac and named the home folder. I want to change it to my name, not theirs. How do I do that?

It is Not easy to do, unfortunately. Here are the instructions for the procedure:
http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1428

Problem: securely erasing home folder after enabling file vault

I enabled file vault. It took 4 days (125 GB) to "securely erase home folder", then when it finally reached 100% I got an error message that it could not be erased after all. I also now got an icon on the desktop (protected house) showing my home folder. Anybody experience with this? What do I do to securely erase? What can I do to speed it up? I have 4GB RAM and a HD of 500GB

open /Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app
At the prompt type:
diskutil secureErase freespace 0 /
(press return)
This will secure erase free space on your boot volume.
Level "0" (zero) is a Single-pass zero-fill erase. Levels 0 through 4 are supported.
Here is a full description of the different erase levels: 0 - Single-pass zero-fill erase.
A. 1 - Single-pass random-fill erase.
B. 2 - US DoD 7-pass secure erase.
C. 3 - Gutmann algorithm 35-pass secure erase.
D. 4 - US DoE algorithm 3-pass secure erase.
for more info (in Terminal) type:
man diskutil
(press return)
This should take considerably less time than 4 days. On my Mac Pro with 162GB boot volume,
130GB free (I keep my data on a different volume) it takes about 10 minutes using level "0".
Disk Free Space Warnings are normal during operation and can be ignored.
more info about it from apple support:
http://support.apple.com/kb/TA24002
You can invoke the erase procedure from Disk Utility GUI interface, but it usually is quicker
when run from terminal.
Kj ♘

How to replace home folder after yosemite erase-reinstall?

Hi, I did an erase-reinstall and then simply copied my backed-up home folder (administrator's home folder) back into the new home folder but this has not worked well. Can anyone tell me the correct procedure of how to restore the home folder. I have a Time Machine back-up from a previous online Yosemite install (not an erase-install) as well as a regular back-up on a separate drive. Can I fix this up (i.e. remove the whole current home folder and replace it properly) without doing another erase-install of yosemite? Many thanks, Barak

baltwo, out of interest, I just found this at: http://www.theinstructional.com/guides/how-to-re-run-the-os-x-setup-assistant
How to Re-Run the OS X Setup Assistant
Under certain circumstances, it can be advantageous to re-run the Setup Assistant. Using some command-line trickery, we can do just this without having to erase and reinstall OS X...
Option?

Can I delete Original Media folder after its all been transcoded?

So i remember reading that most footage you import should be transcoded. Though Final Cut Pro "works natively with formats like h.264 and dslr movs, it is better to have it optimized into Pro Res and transcoded." Having listened to that, I have Optimized all of my media that I have importated however now I have double the media in my FCP Events folders because I have both Original Media and Transcoded media. This leads me to a few questions...
1) Can I delete the Original Media folder if all my my media is transcoded? How will this effect my timeline and projects? Will this free up space? How can I verify all of my clips have bene transcoded?
2) Can I delete the Transcoded Media and go back to using the Original Media? Will this mess up my timeline and projects that I have started editing or will it revert the media in my projects back to the Original? Which would run faster/better performacne Original Or Transcoded? I shoot all of my footage on a Canon 7d DSLR 24/30 fps 1080p, H.264.
3) What workflows have you used so that you dont dobule anything? If this project is a loss, what should I be doing in future events when importing? Should I send to Compressor and transcode there BEFORE I import into FCP. That way I am only importing the Transcoded stuff?
Thoughts?
Mike

1- Yes, you can delete the Original Media folder, FCP will only read from your Optimized Media folder then. But move it to the trash first, then launch FCP X and test it out, before emptying the trash.
2- Yes, again, test it as I mentioned in 1 above. Once you remove either Original or Optimized, it's gone, that's it.
3- Always let FCP do the transcoding, doing it in Compressor gains you nothing. You shold base your decision to optimize on the hardware you're using and the amount of storage space you have available. H.264 is super compressed. ProRes uncompresses it and is more of it's natural file size.

User account missing files and preferences?? Not from renaming home folder

Hi all,
After some strange behaviour in Apple Color, upon rebooting, my user account has returned to default. I had many items on the desktop and various subfolders in the documents folder. All pictures. Music. All are now gone. Desktop and dock have been reset to default.
The user folder still exists but everything I had in there is gone.
Another user may have been created called "root" containing only
/Library
/Documents/Color Documents...etc
I am aware of the problem with changing the short name or renaming the home folder (after sifting through this forum) and it is definitely not this problem.
Maybe its somehow related but I definitely did not rename any of these things myself. And there is no duplicated user account with all my files in it.
Any help or ideas would be greatly appreciated.
Cheers
Nate
ps. Is it possible to restore the system to an earlier time like in Windows?
I've read somewhere that a Previous System folder exists and it might be possible with Disk Utility but I can't find this folder anywhere.
Message was edited by: stoney23

Hi there,
Thanks for the reply. I've managed to restore most of my important stuff using a file recovery software so I'm at peace with the loss of only a few files now. I'll just have to start rebuilding my dock and preferences again now which is not the end of the world.
After a bit of thinking about it I'm 95% sure this is what happened.
Color tried to save an image file with the same name as the folder I had made storing all my Color project saves. The folder was called Post. I'm not quite sure how its possible but it managed to overwrite the folder with the new image file. Now there is a Color image file (with no extension) there called Post and no folder.
Then I tried to save the Color project and of course it told me the project directory was missing and it will create a new one. I'm guessing this is when Color bulldozed through my user account to create the folder Color Documents where it DIDN'T save the file anyway
Leaving me with a default user account deleting everything that was 'added' to the account previously.
It also created another user account called 'root' in which there is also only a Color Library/preferences and documents folder
Is that normal that things like that can just happen?
I guess from here I will just try and finish my project and afterwards do a re-install of the OS just to be sure - checking the Archive and Install option this time
Unless you have any other ideas from what I've told you.
Thanks again for replying
Nate

Home folder: can't "rename" in finder per step 3 in Apple's HT1428

Ran Setup Assistant on a new MacBook Air and transferred everything (settings and all) over from my old computer (disabled) using its Time Capsule backup during Setup Assistant's original (and only) run.
Problem is: the home folder on the new computer retains the old computer's name. I read in quick "Help" (from Finder's top menu line) that "You can’t change the name of a home folder. If you want to use a different name, you must create a new user (this requires administrator privileges)."
But Apple publishes HT1428: "OS X: How to change your account name or home directory name," so I try it.   OS X 10.7 and later directions say:
     [create new admin account, log out of old, log in under new, and]
     2. Navigate to the /Users folder in Finder.
     3. Rename the home folder for the old account, being sure to make note of both the old account name and the new account name.
After logging in as new admin, when I highlight the old account's home folder name, it will not "box itself out" so I can change its name. "Get Info-ing" the folder (file) shows the Name & Extension grayed out and unchangeable.
So I'm stalled out at the very beginning. Any ideas?
Thinking . . . HT1428 gives a different procedure for home folder name change in OS X 10.6, using terminal to "mv" a new name into place. The old computer was 10.6.8 and everything about it came over during setup. Could it need the OS X 10.6 instructions?
And am I playing with fire?

I don't see anything different about yours from mine. I have no problem renaming another account home folder.
All the reasons I can guess at for it not being available you seem to have verified.
Copy and paste in this command in Terminal. Make sure there is a space after what you paste, then drag in the old home folder. It will list the ACLs and any Finder flags on the folder.
ls -dleO
You should only see this after the line listing the folder info:
0: group:everyone deny delete
In the first line of the output, you should see a - between "staff" and the file size number.
There isn't any difference between the move command and doing it with the Finder, except the safety of not typing anything wrong. I imagine the Finder calls mv when it renames, but I don't know for sure.

Rename original home folder after Set Up

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