Change your short username

Nov 26, '01 10:52:24PM

Contributed by: robg

Someone asked me whether it was possible to change the short username in OS X. I knew it wasn't possible in the Login preferences panel (it's greyed out), but I thought NetInfo Manager should have a way to do this. In looking at the "Users" panel in NetInfo Manager, it seems like it would be a simple matter of changing all references from "oldshortname" to "newshortname". I did not, however wish to try this on my own machine (since it's working well!), so I went digging for some answers.

I found two interesting articles (one, two) on the MacNN forums which seem to describe the process fairly well. The essence of the solution seems to be:

  1. Login as root
  2. Rename the /Users/old_username folder to /Users/new_username
  3. Open NetInfo Manager and click on the lock to allow changes (enter admin password)
  4. Click on the "Users" column, and then edit any reference to "old_username" and replace it with "new_username"
  5. Click on the "Groups" column, and make sure "new_username" is in any of the same groups as "old_username". Wheel, in particular, will be an important group!
  6. Save the changes in NetInfo Manager and quit.
  7. Logout and login as the new 'shortuser' and see if everything works.
Please note that I have not tried this myself! Make sure you have a backup of your important user files before you start, just in case! If you know of a better way to do this, or have actually tried changing your short username, please let us know about it!

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Mac OS X Hints
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