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Renaming the Home Folder Username

S

scouser75

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Oct 7, 2008
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I've just renamed my home folder, which previously was showing my "name surname". I changed it to my nickname.

But once I don't this, my Mac restarted and I had to reset everything - iCloud account, my dock, my bank details, trackpad... everything. Is this normal? Or have I messed up somewhere? If so, I'm happy to reinstall from scratch as I haven't really done much on it yet.
 
1) Go to System Settings -> Users & Groups
2) CTRL Click on your User Name to bring up 'Advanced Options'. Authenticate with an admin poassword
3) Check the path to your renamed Home folder under 'Home directory'
4) Log out and back in again
 
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Thanks guys. So what part did I miss out?

Right now I'm resetting my emails.

Have i messed up even more?
 
scouser75 said:
Thanks guys. So what part did I miss out?

Right now I'm resetting my emails.

Have i messed up even more?
Click to expand...
The name of your home folder will be the short username of your account. You probably now have 2 different home folders in the /Users directory. Just renaming that folder without following the proper steps in the link from post 3 of this thread will cause your computer to be unable to find all of your previous documents and settings.
 
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chrfr said:
The name of your home folder will be the short username of your account. You probably now have 2 different home folders in the /Users directory. Just renaming that folder without following the proper steps in the link from post 3 of this thread will cause your computer to be unable to find all of your previous documents and settings.
Click to expand...
Doh! Is this fixable? Or is it best to reinstall everything?
 
KALLT said:
Follow the steps as outlined in the link above, then log out and back in. You can worry about the second home directory later.
Click to expand...
Thank you. Will do this later tonight. Shall I come.back to you guys for the second home directory?

And outta curiosity, would I have been able to select/change the user name when I initially setup my new Mac?
 
For some reason, the onlyadministrator account is mine. I don't have a separate admin account. Is this normal? If so, can I just make the changes from my own account, which is the admin account?
 
Thanks everyone for putting up with my silly questions and for all your help to get this sorted.

I've just returned to setting up a Mac after upgrading from my trusted and much loved 2009 Mac Pro. This all feels way too new for me 😲

Brace yourselves for a few more questions in the not so distant future 😂 I will of course Google first - and read the instructions properly,before messaging 🤣
 
Thank you. Normally I have my wife added but I haven't got round to doing this yet. I'll add her later and as admin.

But in this case, as jcscol mentioned, I could've made the amendment direct from my account, right?
 
The article states prior to the steps if you only have one account, create a second account. You can just create a temporary account called temp. simply create that, logout of your existing and log into that to make your changes. Then you can delete the temp account from there.
 
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Right, I think I may have worked myself into am unnecessary corner here!

I've renamed my Home Folder, which is now different to my previous Mac. I now want to move my Photos and iTunes libraries to the new Mac.

Normally, I'd use Migration Assistant. But as I've renamed my Home Folder on the new Mac, I believe this won't work according to the links I've searched.

How can I now move iTunes and Photos please?

I have a backups for both files on an external drive. Can I simply drag and drop those into Photos and Music, respectively?Or am I dreaming of it being so simple? :D
 
You have a few options:

• Option 1 – Using Migration Assistant
With this, it does not matter what your Mac 1 home folder/username is or your Mac 2's home folder/username is. it will put it where you tell Migration Assistant to. This will ensure all the files associated with apps move over.

• Option 2 – Manual drag and drop
Essentially the same thing...just copy the Music folder and Photos folder over to a hard drive or via file share to the Mac.
You may have to re-authorize your Music app and reset up iCloud Photo Library if you have that enabled.

• Option 3 – iCloud copies
If you have all of these in the cloud (iTunes/purchased music or iCloud Photo Library) you can simply just download originals to your new Mac.
 
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ZMacintosh said:
You have a few options:

• Option 1 – Using Migration Assistant
With this, it does not matter what your Mac 1 home folder/username is or your Mac 2's home folder/username is. it will put it where you tell Migration Assistant to. This will ensure all the files associated with apps move over.

• Option 2 – Manual drag and drop
Essentially the same thing...just copy the Music folder and Photos folder over to a hard drive or via file share to the Mac.
You may have to re-authorize your Music app and reset up iCloud Photo Library if you have that enabled.

• Option 3 – iCloud copies
If you have all of these in the cloud (iTunes/purchased music or iCloud Photo Library) you can simply just download originals to your new Mac.
Click to expand...
Thank you for this. I like the sound of Option 1.

I tried earlier to drag and drop and each time all the music from my old Mac didn't copy over to the new Mac.

I have a feeling some of the file formats don't work On Ventura. My old Mac is running El Capitan.
 
xgman said:
I remember this being a nightmare. Be careful!
Click to expand...
Thanks xgman. So far all seems to be well. But thenI haven't had much time on the new machine yet. Hopefully will get to play around on it this weekend.
 
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