Name of My Documents Folder "Inherited" from Default User

[JCW]

Following advice of the Que "Using Microsoft Windows XP Professional" book, I
configured one (administrator) account -- call it Administrator2 -- the way
I wanted it (DUN, printers, desktop, start menu, etc.) and then copied its
profile onto that of "Default User." Then I logged onto a new (User) account
-- call it User1 -- which did indeed pick up the configuration settings that
I wanted from "Default User."

There is one quirk, however: When viewed from the "Computer Administrator"
account, the names of the "My Documents" folders under "Documents and
Settings" for Administrator2, "Default User," and User1 are all the same:
"Administrator2's Documents." I'm worried that this may cause confusion when
I move one or more of these "My Documents" folders to a different disk
volume. Is there a way that I can rename the two anomalous "Administrator2's
Documents" folders to "Default User's Documents" and "User1's Documents,"
respectively, without causing other problems, or is this just a non-issue?

 

[JCW]

An addendum to the previous question: In the past (on W2K) I have
successfully moved the entire "Documents and Settings" folder to a disk
volume separate from the OS (although I don't immediately remember how). If
this is acceptable on XP Pro, does anybody have blow-by-blow instructions for
correctly doing so?

 

[nrogers64]

Just before copying the custom profile over the "Default User" profile, log
on with your custom profile and go to this key in the registry:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunOnce

If that key doesn't exist, then create it. Once you're there, create a new
string called "Initialize My Documents" with a value of "rundll32
mydocs.dll,PerUserInit" (without the quotes). This will fix the "My
Documents", "My Music", and "My Pictures" folders. It will NOT fix the "My
Videos" folder.

After you create that string, log off and then log on using the
Administrator account and copy the custom profile over the "Default User"
profile. Voila!

 

[JCW]

I appreciate the reply, nrogers64. Meanwhile, I got past most of this
problem with random fiddling, but your method probably would have been
better. I hope it helps sombody else. -- JCW

 

[JCW]

Dear nrogers64 -- Do I assume correctly that I should remove this ...\RunOnce
key from the previously customized user's registry after his profile has been
copied over to the Default User? Should it also be removed from the target
user's registry after HIS first logon? Or do these RunOnce keys just vanish
or become irrelevant after first use? (I ask this because I'm now trying to
do the same trick on another computer.) -- JCW

 

[JCW]

A follow-up to my last: After clicking OK to copy the profile and Yes to
overwrite the original Default User profile, my machine hangs up and I must
force a power down. (This happened the first time too, but I don't remember
the details. My notes say it worked the second time, after temporarily
making the target account an administrator, but this time it already was.) I
powered up again, logged on as Administrator (this time shutting down
ZoneAlarm, which I suppose might be trying to prevent the copy), and was able
to successfully copy the profile. What do you think I was doing/have done
wrong? -- JCW

 

[JCW]

Thanks again, nrogers64! Worked like a charm once I stopped worrying about
the registry change in the parent account (see earlier replies). -- JCW