Login ID vs File Sharing

[braytonak]

I have a three-computer network. Shortly after setting up the newest computer, I decided to change the name of the first user installed on that machine. (From Jimmy to Jim.) All three computers each have the same two users (with identical passwords...Jim and Shawn). I recently found that the two older machines wouldn't allow the newest computer to access their shared folders. The solution was to add the original user from the newest computer (Jimmy) to the other two computers before they would allow that computer to gain access. (Yet the user was renamed Jim.)

My question is: When you change the name of a user, does file and printer sharing continue to use the original name? I didn't think that it should be necessary to create a brand new user, instead of changing the name, in order to use the updated User account on all the network shares. Is the User Accounts function to change the name of an account just for presentation, not function?

 

[nweaver]

I have found that windows can be very wierd when renaming accounts. I really wish thay had something better in home for managing users. THat control panel thing doesn't cut it. One more reason to use pro for me.
if you have pro, you get a lot more info by right clicking my computer and going to manage, there is a users and groups in there that is (imho) much better for managing local users.

 

[braytonak]

Glad I'm not the only one to think that User Account management is strange. I guess I was naive to just assume that when you renamed an account, that the entire thing renamed. Apparently just the "alias" of the account changes? The only way that I noticed this quirk was, when in Computer Management, I looked in "Shared Folders" \ "Sessions", and saw a session for the old user account on the new computer.

I guess this just teaches the lesson that you better know the User Account name the first time, because changing it really involves creating a new account and moving the data from the old one.