New User Profile

[Taggart]

Under Windows 2000 Pro, I would like to create a new user profile, and copy all desktop icons and also Firefox bookmarks from the administrator profile to this new user profile. Is this possible, and how? Thanks in advance.

[friend2]

When you say "copy all desktop icons", are these shortcuts to programs ?

If it is, simply copying e'm wont do you any good.

Depending on what program it is, some installers will give you the option to install for

all profiles, or, only the one you're in.

Stupid thing is, some programs don't.

You'll then be forced to re-install the software in each profile you wanna use it in.

[astral]

Create the new account. Control panel/User Accounts.

Logon to the new id.

Now logon as the original id and go the File Explorer.

Look under My Computer/Local Disk/Documents and Settings.

You should see at least 2 folders, the old account and the new one.

Select /Old account/Desktop/ and you will see all the icons that appear on your desk top.

Copy these files/shortcuts to /New Account/Desktop/

You should not find that the icons appear when you logon with the New Account name.

However as Friend2 says, some of the programmes may not work as you expect and their data will not necessarily

be in the folder for the New Account. You may have to re-install.

[Rice_King]

Create the new account. Control panel/User Accounts.

Logon to the new id.

Now logon as the original id and go the File Explorer.

Look under My Computer/Local Disk/Documents and Settings.

You should see at least 2 folders, the old account and the new one.

Select /Old account/Desktop/ and you will see all the icons that appear on your desk top.

Copy these files/shortcuts to /New Account/Desktop/

You should not find that the icons appear when you logon with the New Account name.

However as Friend2 says, some of the programmes may not work as you expect and their data will not necessarily

be in the folder for the New Account. You may have to re-install.

Almost right.

The CORRECT way:

(I only have WinXP installed here and this is from memory. This procedure is nearly the same on BOTH OS's so I won't be too far off the mark.)

After creating the account and logging into it, logoff and logon with the original profile. Go to CONTROL PANEL > SYSTEM. Click on the ADVANCED tab. Under the USER PROFILES box, click settings. There you will see the profiles listed with buttons for COPY TO, DELETE, etc.. Do your copy to profile here in this dialogue box. This method not only copys the data, but also your settings. The previously posted methods will only copy the data to the profile and not user settings.

Using Windows Explorer to copy a profile will give cause for some people to state, "some of the programmes may not work as you expect and their data will not necessarily be in the folder for the New Account. You may have to re-install."

The good news is, that if you followed the wrong procedure, just delete the new profile in the USER PROFILE dialogue box and re-create it the right way.

Edited January 5, 2007 by Rice_King

[Taggart]

Well, I created the new profile. Even after doing a copy from the administrator profile, it only gave me about half the shortcuts on the desktop. Not all the programs copied over. Disappointed to see that Firefox didn't copy over "any" of my bookmarks. Looks like I may have to find what's missing and download some of the programs all over again. Thanks for trying.