User Account Name - how to really change?

[Guest]

I want to change the name of my user account name, but I read somewhere that
the Control Panel > User Account pane does not really change the name
completely in all areas of the system and then said how to, but I cant
remember the steps.

Can someone tell me if this is true and if so how to ensure that I
completely change my account name on my computer (stand alone, no network).

I also recall that this book recommended to not use a name with spaces to
avoid possible command line issues later on - true??

 

[Malke]

I want to change the name of my user account name, but I read
somewhere that the Control Panel > User Account pane does not really
change the name completely in all areas of the system and then said
how to, but I cant remember the steps.

Can someone tell me if this is true and if so how to ensure that I
completely change my account name on my computer (stand alone, no
network).

I also recall that this book recommended to not use a name with spaces
to avoid possible command line issues later on - true??

You are correct in that you do not want to just change the account name.
Instead, you should make a new user account and copy the data and
settings over from the old account. Here are instructions:

Copy a User Account -
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?kbid=811151

You will need to log into the new account once before you can copy
anything to it.

It is correct that you should not include spaces in account or computer
names. A space is an actual character not the absence of one. Although
you are not currently networking, it will be easier if you ever do buy
another computer.

Malke

 

[Guest]

Malke, thanks for the response, but the article that I read basically
addressed 2 areas in XP Pro where the name needed to be changed, the User
Account pane which was somewhat cosmetic, and then somewhere else which was
the 'real' windows data > I want to say like where corporate administrators
manually change how people log on, whether they need to enter a password,
stuff like that, but I dont know where this is. Have you heard of this?

 

[Malke]

Malke, thanks for the response, but the article that I read basically
addressed 2 areas in XP Pro where the name needed to be changed, the
User Account pane which was somewhat cosmetic, and then somewhere else
which was the 'real' windows data > I want to say like where corporate
administrators manually change how people log on, whether they need to
enter a password,
stuff like that, but I dont know where this is. Have you heard of
this?

That's what I'm telling you - you don't want to just rename the user
account as a cosmetic device. You want to create a new account instead
because changing just the name of the account does not change any of
the underlying files/folders. Other than that, I'm afraid I'm probably
misunderstanding what you are trying to accomplish. Try searching in
XP's Help & Support for terms like "logon" and "user accounts".

The computer name is the name of the machine. This is set/changed in the
Control Panel System applet on the Computer Name tab.

Malke

 

[Steven L Umbach]

You can change your user logon name and anywhere that operating system
refers to you by your SID the new name will be used but if you have any
folders with your name including your user profile folder the old name will
still show though you will still be allowed access since permissions are
assigned by your user SID but resolved to your user name for us humans. The
link below may be of help. Unless you have a real compelling reason you may
want to leave your user name as is. --- Steve

http://windowsxp.mvps.org/userpath.htm