subfolders of 'Documents and Settings'.

[phil]

At one time, the name of my subfolder within 'Documents and Settings' was
just 'Phil' (my account name), but now it is 'Phil.XXXX' where XXXX is the
name of my computer. The 'Phil' folder still exists, but current activity
such as Favorites now shows up in 'Phil.XXX'.

I do not have a domain, but I have a small peer-to-peer (workgroup) network
of 3 XP Pro systems.

Under Documents and Settings, there is a folder for each of those two names,
as well as a similar pair for another user account that I set up on my
machine. The same thing occurs on my wife's machine.

Why is it now Phil.XXXX instead of just Phil?

 

[Sharon F]

At one time, the name of my subfolder within 'Documents and Settings' was
just 'Phil' (my account name), but now it is 'Phil.XXXX' where XXXX is the
name of my computer. The 'Phil' folder still exists, but current activity
such as Favorites now shows up in 'Phil.XXX'.

I do not have a domain, but I have a small peer-to-peer (workgroup) network
of 3 XP Pro systems.

Under Documents and Settings, there is a folder for each of those two names,
as well as a similar pair for another user account that I set up on my
machine. The same thing occurs on my wife's machine.

Why is it now Phil.XXXX instead of just Phil?

You installed Windows over itself (instead of running a repair install).
You created user accounts with the same names that were in the last
setup. XP went ahead and created the accounts as requested but tagged
on .XXX to differentiate the new account folders from the old.

 

[phil]

Thank you so much for the explanation... It wasn't a problem, but I really
wanted to understand it.

 

[Lorne]

I had the same thing happen when I had to reinstall. If you do not like it
the following steps will put it back how it was:

1] Rename folder Phil as Phil.old
2] Back up the whole of Phil.XXX to a new folder (may not be necessary but
belt & braces approach)
3] Log in as another user with admin rights, delete account Phil.
4] reboot (also may not be necesary - not sure)
5] Log in to an admin account & create Phil as a new user
6] copy all files from the backup of Phil.XXX (and any you need from
Phil.old) to the newly created folder called Phil.

And everything is as it was although you may have to redo some of your
customizations if you have them. Can't do this for the all users folder as
far as I know (I assume it is now all users.XXX) but somebody else may be
able to tell you how. Do not edit the regidtry entries for the default all
users account location as that caused me all sorts of problems!!

 

[phil]

Thanks Lorne,

This only happened to two of the user accounts, and 'All Users' is not one
of them. You would think it would happen to that as well. At any rate, I
don't mind the Phil.XXXX, I just wanted to understand when and how it
happened. Therefore, following the "ain't broke... don't fix it" approach,
I won't attempt to rename anything. Next time, I'll just remember Sharon's
advice and do a "Repair" install (or maybe a reformat and start over).

Phil

I had the same thing happen when I had to reinstall. If you do not like it
the following steps will put it back how it was:

1] Rename folder Phil as Phil.old
2] Back up the whole of Phil.XXX to a new folder (may not be necessary but
belt & braces approach)
3] Log in as another user with admin rights, delete account Phil.
4] reboot (also may not be necesary - not sure)
5] Log in to an admin account & create Phil as a new user
6] copy all files from the backup of Phil.XXX (and any you need from
Phil.old) to the newly created folder called Phil.

And everything is as it was although you may have to redo some of your
customizations if you have them. Can't do this for the all users folder as
far as I know (I assume it is now all users.XXX) but somebody else may be
able to tell you how. Do not edit the regidtry entries for the default all
users account location as that caused me all sorts of problems!!

At one time, the name of my subfolder within 'Documents and Settings' was
just 'Phil' (my account name), but now it is 'Phil.XXXX' where XXXX is the
name of my computer. The 'Phil' folder still exists, but current activity
such as Favorites now shows up in 'Phil.XXX'.

I do not have a domain, but I have a small peer-to-peer (workgroup) network
of 3 XP Pro systems.

Under Documents and Settings, there is a folder for each of those two names,
as well as a similar pair for another user account that I set up on my
machine. The same thing occurs on my wife's machine.

Why is it now Phil.XXXX instead of just Phil?