osx first timer

[^NuERA^]

Just picked up a used G5 and Im trying to get over a few basic frustrations...

i can do most things, but my BIGGEST frustartion is everytime i restart the settings go back to some sort of defult...

so heres what im trying to do

- trying to remain name the 'home' from the old owners name to mine. i can do this, but upon restart, it goes back to his.

- trying to have the dock stay the same size with the same icons as i left it before i reboot

- it also keeps going back to the defult internal speaker and i have to change it to my soundcard everytime

i know i will like it, i just need to figure out how the fuck to use it

 

[oh toro]

first... do yourself a favor and either get a novice book on os x to learn important concepts (mac and unix) or go to the apple store and have someone there provide a basic orientation.

ok... just because you can, does not mean you should. do not rename anything outside of a user home directory (including the name of the user home directory/directories). for example, never rename Applications, Library, System, Users and the directories that reside within Users. at the very least you will break functionality. at worst, your computer will not boot.

the reason why you're presented with default settings upon restarting is because renaming the home directory makes the home directory (the one you've renamed) inaccessible to the operating system (os) resulting in the os creating a new set of default directories for the user account you've logged into. this is happening every time you rename the home directory. let's just say there's a lot more to renaming a home directory and have it work than you would care to know.

that said, go into system preferences > accounts and create a user account with a name of your choosing (keep in mind that you will not be able to change the shortname after you've created the account. the shortname is the name of the home directory for any given user account) and make sure you assign administrator rights to it. make sure to also change the automatic login from the existing account to the your account (if you want that) or disable it so you're presented with a login screen upon startup. if you're not running 10.4.x, restart and then login to your account. if you expect others to use your computer, you may want to create a non-admin user account for this purpose so that your settings and files are not accessible to them.

one other thing to note is that it is generally not safe to rename, delete or move the default directories residing within a home directory as they are expected to be there by applications as well as the os. you can create your own directories and files amongst those that are there by default.