Taking ownership of files

[swiftie]

My SSD C: drive failed catastrophically a few days ago and the local computer shop installed a replacement, and loaded Windows 7.

I re-created my userid (let's say "Brian") and now I have a system full mostly of files/directories with the userid S-1-4-13-7939939197-4894238170-1210716617-1234

Is there some automated way for me to change the ownerid of these files to "Brian" ?

If this were Linux, I'd wage in with chown ...

I'd prefer not to blindly take ownership of all the files on the 5 drives affected, as some of the files may have valid ownerid's (perhaps this is impossible, but I don't have time to check)

 

[MSClin]

Is there some automated way for me to change the ownerid of these files to "Brian" ?

No. I don't think that there is a manual way in the first place.

 

[samuria]

Why have the tool to take ownership which you can run against a file folder or disk the number is your old SID

 

[Barman58]

The take ownership function is a tool that I was taught only to use in case of emergency

Although I fully respect that point of view and still personally follow the rule fully today, as the majority of users are not versed in the "art" of NTFS file permissions, I suggest that I can be used in either the old fashioned manual way or the slightly more automated Right click shortcut. - Take Ownership Shortcut

You need to apply the take ownership function to the top level of the folder tree on each "Data" drive, and ensure that the default settings to cascade the permissions down the tree. Applying the take ownership function to any part of the system disk or partitions. There will be folders that fail to change ownership during the cascade but these are usually system remnants that can be ignored - In the case of a true data folder causing issues it may be needed to perform more complex permissions editing, these errors are normally due to a major mismatch of the existing permissions and you will need to switch off the cascade, manually correct the permissions, and then restart the cascade from this point.

however, This could get most of your data back to acceptable permissions, without errors

This usage should only be considered on a truly damaged system drive permissions and then only by those who really understand the NTFS system if you have the standard data folders that come set-up with windows you can take ownership of the level of the tree that is involved Eg take ownership of the documents folder and any contained folders and files but leave the Users\Username folders alone.

The fact is that if you have a new install or even a repair install in use there should be no need to do anything to the permissions on the system drive

Edit. There used to be a SID manipulation utility in the Sysinternals suite - that may be worth a look PsGetSid - Windows Sysinternals | Microsoft Docs

 

[swiftie]

Whilst fiddling around, all the unwanted file ownerids just vanished.

I know that problems that go away by themselves will also come back by themselves, but right now I'm OK.