Is there a way to merge the files/permissions from one user on a computer to another user on the same computer WITHOUT overwriting the main users files?

Question

Is there a way to merge the files/permissions from one user on a computer to another user on the same computer WITHOUT overwriting the main users files?

Matthew Beck 1

I have been trying to figure this out for most of the day.

I am in a company IT department and one user inherited both the job/computer of the last person who did her job.

On the computer there are two accounts , the one from the user who is gone (but current user still needs access) and the current user who has done several things in her own account.

She has to constantly jump back and forth between accounts and she is finding that frustrating.

Is there a way to merge the files/permissions from the old account to the new without overwriting the stuff in the newer account ?

Or will I have to do a painful external hard drive, save all the master folders (documents, downloads ,desktop etc. ) and transfer them to the main machine, getting complaints its unorganized now (no duh, we combined two users stuff on to one) ?

Thanks in advance, Microsoft has been of no help putting me in chat transfer limbo and when I call and talk to a real person I am told if I don't have a support contract I am out of luck.

2 answers

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Answer 1

MotoX80 36,401

The old Win2003 reskit has the subinacl tool that has a replace option to substitute one account with another on the NTFS permissions.

https://www.robvanderwoude.com/subinacl.php

Unfortunately Microsoft no longer provides a download link for subinacl. It's still there on the web archive.

https://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/ie/en-US/94ec4f33-e84b-49fd-86c4-84b1b4c40b11/where-can-i-download-subinacl

I also found a free tool that appears to have the same functionality, but I have never used it.

https://helgeklein.com/setacl/feature-set/

Matthew Beck 1 Reputation point

2021-11-12T18:34:00.973+00:00

I appreciate the response. But not really what I am looking for.
I will admit its a unorthodox request.
The company should have copied all the files/permissions into a new account when the new user was hired, but it is what it is.

Looking more likely I will have to grab a 500 GB external hard drive and copy everything from the old account to the new.
MotoX80 36,401 Reputation points

2021-11-12T19:01:22.903+00:00

I guess that I don't understand what you want to do.

I assumed that you had folders like C:\Users\OriginalUser\Documents or C:\Data\Somefolder, where only the OriginalUser's account had access. And your NewUser had to log on with that original account in order to access the files. Using subinacl you would update the permissions to allow NewUser to access the files. You could also define a symbolic link so that C:\Users\NewUser\Documents\OriginalUser pointed to C:\Users\OriginalUser\Documents. That way NewUser would see everything in their documents folder.

What rights do Administrators have on these files/folders? Is adding NewUser to the admins group possible? Is the data all on the C: drive or on network shares on a server?

Perhaps if you could explain an example or two, someone else might have another idea.

Answer 2

As per merging of files, this is possible by going to the C:\Users folder. Under the users folder, you'll be able to see the accounts folder which contains your personal files under Desktop, Documents, Music, etc.

You may simply copy the folders under user folder to the other user profile folder to copy them over. If the same file on the same location is existing, a pop up will show up indicating if you would want to replace the same files. Click on apply to all and this won't duplicate any files and will simply move some files that are not on the other user account.

There's no specific process to merge Users in Windows, however you can manually perform the action by copying the data from one to the other (assuming the account you're logged in with is an Admin). To copy data, just open two File Explorer windows and simply copy/paste the files from the incorrect account to the account you want to use (you can browse to C:\Users\Account A and C:\Users\Account B, respectively).

Once everything is moved, you can remove the old user account.

--If the reply is helpful, please Upvote and Accept as answer--

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Is there a way to merge the files/permissions from one user on a computer to another user on the same computer WITHOUT overwriting the main users files?

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