User Profiles - Create and Move During Windows 7 Installation

Britton30 said:

I think it is a bad idea since the system looks for those specific files names. If it doesn't find them it could create them on C:\, negating the process.

I totally agree. It is always a bad idea to rename Windows system folders.

Arqfaim said:

So if I keep 2 parallel installs, say Win7 and Win8, there's no accepted way for 2 \Users and \ProgramData folders to share the same partition?

If that be the case it's redundant to point the redirect to D:\Users or E:\Users or X:\Users . D: E: or X: is enough.

To put it simple: it is not recommend to rename any of the system folders. Also, to secure that the system works as it should, all main system folders should be on root level. Hence, you cannot relocate system folders from different installations to the same partition.

Arqfaim said:

P.S. Can I redirect to a subdirectory or do they have to be on root?

See my comment above.

Kari

So it turns out that neither of us was right but neither was totally wrong either :)
FYI:
In my "experiment" Windows 7 did create a profiles folder called "E:\Profiles Folder". That is what it lists in a command line dir. That's also what it's called looking at E: from outside Windows.
But in an Explorer window it doesn't display as "\Profiles Folder", it shows as "\Users" !!

What type of link is this being displayed?
How can I make Explorer show the true name while retaining functionality?
Can the same mechanism be used to soft-rename some other folder (inside Explorer)?

Perhaps this falls out of topic. Just trying to learn, not a specific problem to solve.
Thanks

I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about? How was I wrong, what did you do?

It is your computer, your Windows and your way to do things. I can only suggest and recommend something, based on what I know and my own experience. If you choose not to follow instructions and recommendations given to you, it's totally your own known decision.

Only explanation I can think of for Windows using symlinks for your strangely named Users system folder is that as the renaming really is a bad idea and might cause big problems in the future, Windows kind of protects itself a bit creating the Users as and where it should be.

By the way, one sure way to screw your system is what you did for ProgramData folder, renaming it.

You chose not to follow instructions given to you. I choose not to assist you in any way when these dumb decisions will later cause issues for you.

I hope it will continue to work for you and you have made good back ups for the system. Most w7 or any Windows OS created system folder have special properties built-in which can't be recreated by making a new folder with the same name.

Britton30 said:

I hope it will continue to work for you and you have made good back ups for the system. Most w7 or any Windows OS created system folder have special properties built-in which can't be recreated by making a new folder with the same name.

Exactly.

Using sysprep and an unattended answer file to relocate Users and ProgramData changes the values of two Windows Environmental Variables. Let's use the ProgramData folder as an example:

You can open the ProgramData folder in File Explorer using its variable name. Type %programdata% in address field followed by Enter and the ProgramData is opened, even when it's hidden as it by default is. This folder is kind of AppData folder for all users, various programs saving application specific information shared by all users as in opposite for AppData which stores the same information when it's user specific.

A well coded application does not look this folder by its de facto name or location (C:\ProgramData) but uses instead its variable name %programdata%. In an ideal situation this allows the ProgramData folder to have whatever name because the variable tells for the application in question where the folder is and what its name is.

However not all apps are coded following these correct guidelines. Some programs have the location hard coded using the default name and location. Because of this I have always recommended leaving the original ProgramData in C: there as it never grows to be too big and really is sometimes needed. See this post for an example.

I would not want to add or change anything which could cause even more confusion. I can only see possible issues but no gain in Windows having these two ProgramData folders with different names, the original in C:\ProgramData and the other, relocated and actual one in X:\MyFancyNamedProgramData.

Kari