Two Home Folders?

Posted:
in macOS edited January 2014
I am not sure how I manage to mess this stuff up, but I do.



I upgraded from 10.4.10 to 10.5 yesterday afternoon. Somehow I ended up with a new home folder (named MOB) and the old home folder and all of its contents are still there with the old name (Matthew). When I open iPhoto or iTunes they are empty, but I can see all my photos & music in the old home folder.



I called Apple and they ran me through a process that involves renaming both the home folders, but OS X tells me I can?t rename one because it needs it, nor can I rename the other because I don?t have the appropriate level of permissions. I ran disk utility and repaired permissions and it still didn?t work. Then I tried creating a new account on the machine with admin permissions and logging in as that to try and rename to two files? in the end all that did was create a 3rd home folder.



So I think in the end the best course of action is to move my music and photo?s from the old home folder to the new one, and then just delete the old home folder. What?s the best way to do this so I don?t lose all my play lists, etc:



- Can I just replace the new and empty set of library, music, movie, and photo folders with the old ones?



- Or, do I have to drag everything into iTunes and iPhoto through the front end and recreate all my events and play lists?



- Once I move everything, can I just delete the old home folder whole-sale?



Thanks

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 3
    MarvinMarvin Posts: 15,310moderator
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by mowenbrown View Post


    I am not sure how I manage to mess this stuff up, but I do.



    I work beside someone like you, it's great to know there's more of you out there.



    Quote:
    Originally Posted by mowenbrown View Post


    Somehow I ended up with a new home folder (named MOB) and the old home folder and all of its contents are still there with the old name (Matthew). When I open iPhoto or iTunes they are empty, but I can see all my photos & music in the old home folder.



    The guy I work with managed to do this too but not through an upgrade. I think he just renamed the home folder. I opened Shake to find all my macros missing.



    Quote:
    Originally Posted by mowenbrown View Post


    - Can I just replace the new and empty set of library, music, movie, and photo folders with the old ones?



    - Or, do I have to drag everything into iTunes and iPhoto through the front end and recreate all my events and play lists?



    - Once I move everything, can I just delete the old home folder whole-sale?



    If you can still log in as matthew, just drag all the old stuff in, then log out and log in again as that user and all your settings should be restored. Once you do that, you should be able to delete the other users without losing anything.



    Is there a new account called MOB (i.e does that appear at the login window?) or is there just a folder called MOB?
  • Reply 2 of 3
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Marvin View Post


    I work beside someone like you, it's great to know there's more of you out there.



    Alas, I would bet there are more of us (people who break things) than there are of you (people who can fix things), so I thank you for your help.



    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Marvin View Post


    If you can still log in as matthew, just drag all the old stuff in, then log out and log in again as that user and all your settings should be restored. Once you do that, you should be able to delete the other users without losing anything.



    Is there a new account called MOB (i.e does that appear at the login window?) or is there just a folder called MOB?



    Just a folder called MOB - no new login account. I still login with the name matthew and the same P/W. So I can click on the Music folder from my original home folder and drag to replace the new, empty one that Leapord created?
  • Reply 3 of 3
    MarvinMarvin Posts: 15,310moderator
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by mowenbrown View Post


    Just a folder called MOB - no new login account. I still login with the name matthew and the same P/W. So I can click on the Music folder from my original home folder and drag to replace the new, empty one that Leapord created?



    So when you log in as Matthew, the folder MOB is the active home folder and the folder called Matthew has all the stuff in it?



    If that's the case then that's a bit strange because the account called Matthew should log in with the matthew folder active. What happened where I work would be the equivalent of all the stuff being in MOB and the folder Matthew being the default empty account.



    Can you check your accounts in system prefs to see what users are in there and what their short names are?



    It sounds like there should be a single user called Matthew with the short name MOB. If so then you can drag the stuff from the matthew folder but obviously that will be your short name from now on.
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