Change the Username/Admin name? Need help, previously unsucessful

The "$" is the shell prompt, not part of the username. To see the username type the "id" command. Then you can use "pwd" to see the name of the user home directory.

smokeybear said:

Ok, I went into another setting. Under User & Groups > right click admin account> advanced options. I changed the account name, but it doesn't look like I can change the home folder. Did a little more reading around last night, and if I read correctly, I'm not allowed to change the name of the home folder.

Even though I changed the account name. The home folder remains 'hello'. Any tips on how to progress? Can I even actually change it?

Click to expand...

Did you follow the guide posted by GGJ? While logged in as root, you will essentially delete the old account and create a new one in its place - renaming the home folder in the process.

smokeybear said:

In Lab at the moment, will try it out though. I read over it a little, but was intimidated at the lack of time I had to try and figure out how to login as root user.

Thanks for your patience and understanding all, just trying to learn my way around my Macbook Pro. Great piece of equipment!

Click to expand...

First you will have to enable the root user, which is easy (but potentially dangerous). You can do this in a terminal window by entering:


It will prompt you for your password then ask you to create a password for the root user. After you do this, you will log out of your account and then sign into root. (username: root, password is the one you just created above)

Then follow the instructions in the guide above, log out of root, and sign into your newly created account. Open up a new terminal window and disable the root user:


You will again be prompted to enter your password. After you enter your password you'll get a message that says you've successfully disabled the root user.

Here's what enabling/disabling the root user will look like.