changing account name doesn't change folder name

Question

I had an account named "Name". If I went into cmd with this account the default home directory was C:\Users\Name. Now that I've renamed this account to "Main User" the default home directory is still C:\Users\Name. Any idea how I can change the directory name to match the new account name?

Thanks!

score 4 · Accepted Answer · answered Dec 22 '13 at 07:40

4

The default directory gets its name on a fresh account name, renaming an old user doesn't make the default directory to change as it will cause major problems to many of the programs installed.Best shot is to create a new user and deleting the old user after making the backup of the desired things you might need.

answered Dec 22 '13 at 07:40

Hunter

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If I might add, changing a user profile's folder name will render the folder useless. So when the user will log on he'll get a temporary profile. – EliadTech Dec 22 '13 at 08:12
If any other user are made you can open them and if you change the user profile's folder name you might be able to open the user but the programs will not work properly and you would also not be able to change the user profile's folder name as there are many programs running in background and many programs rely on a folder named AppData inside the folder. – Hunter Dec 22 '13 at 08:17
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I beg to differ. If you change the folder name then the system profile service can't find it and load it, so you'll be logged with a temporary profile which will be deleted after you log off. Programs should run as usual, though all you saved settings and other similar things will be absent (because, as mentioned above, you're logged with a temporary profile). – EliadTech Dec 22 '13 at 08:23
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You are right but loading a user doesn't fully depend on the user profile folder.The user profile folder is for the background process and simply a mainframe for your programs to work.As for the temporary profile only those programs will work which are set to be used by all the users,but any program set for only that user will not work properly. – Hunter Dec 22 '13 at 08:27
so how can i make a duplicate user but with different name, because this answer just says you can't do it. – Muhammad Umer Mar 03 '15 at 16:41

score 2 · Answer 2 · answered Jul 07 '14 at 17:53

I know this is old but I thought I might add that if you are accessing a share on another (non domain) machine (say over a vpn like TeamViewer), you will need to log in with the format computername\username. Using the account's current "changed" name won't work. You need to use the original, as it is in the user folder. I pulled all my hair out and wasted a couple of hours finding this out. Hopefully this helps someone.

changing account name doesn't change folder name

2 Answers2