I've recently done a clean install of 10.14 Mojave on a 2012 MacBook Pro, where I learnt that the easiest way to restore a Home folder from a backup was to use the Migration Assistant app.
Creating a new user with an already existing Home folder
That said, prior to the above knowledge I had already (with a bit of a struggle) successfully copied my Home folder from the backup drive, so I really didn't need to restore it, but just make MacOS recognize that Home folder as a new user.
Well, guess what? Having gone to the "Users & groups" system preference and created a new user with the exact same name as my freshly restored Home folder, this message pops up:
![screenshot-2023-03-23-at-07-39-43-png.2177987]()
In other words: the Home folder is already there on the drive, but MacOS just hasn't "seen" it yet, so all I needed to do was press the above "Use existing folder" button, and after doing its thing I could log out of my current user, then into the newly restored user.
So that's great to know, and has worked fine on that Mac with single 2TB SSD for users, MacOS and apps.
But what about a dual-drive system?
In my Mid-2010 Mac Pro I have Home folders separated from MacOS, on physically separate drives like this:
Drive #1: 1 TB SSD (for MacOS and apps)
Drive #2: 10 TB hard drive (for Home folders)
That Mac has currently got MacOS 10.13.6 High Sierra, but like with the Macbook Pro I'd also like to do a clean install of 10.14 Mojave on it. But if possible without having to restore the Home folders (there's a lot of large files there and it would take a long time to restore). Having discovered the above, how could I apply that to a dual drive system without messing things up?
Obviously, if I just create a new user with the same name as the Home folder it'll do that -but on the SSD (as that's the boot-drive with MacOS on it).
The only other way I can think of is the following, but I'm unsure if this will somehow mess up things:
1) Create a new user with the exact same name as the Home-folder (which will create a new user on the SSD with that same name)
2) Got to the "Advanced options" (in the "Users & groups" system preference, right-click on the newly created user), then click on the "Choose" button next to where it says "Home directory:" where I select the Home-folder on the 10 TB hard drive. This is the same method I used to relocate my Home folders off the SSD to begin with, using DigiLloyd's Mac Performance guide: relocating the Home directory off the boot drive method)
![Screen Shot 2023-04-10 at 23.27.31.png]( "Screen Shot 2023-04-10 at 23.27.31.png")
My guess is at that stage I would get the same alert window asking if I want to "Use existing folder" (see my first screenshot), but since I didn't actually copy the newly created user over from the SSD as in DigiLloyd's instructions I'd get into trouble with differing user ID/UUID. Does anyone know if this is a legit way of doing it, or if there's a different method to go by?
I also don't know why my Apple-ID comes up (maybe because I'm currently logged in with it?) and why there is as "Aliases" entry at the bottom as I never put in anything there.
Creating a new user with an already existing Home folder
That said, prior to the above knowledge I had already (with a bit of a struggle) successfully copied my Home folder from the backup drive, so I really didn't need to restore it, but just make MacOS recognize that Home folder as a new user.
Well, guess what? Having gone to the "Users & groups" system preference and created a new user with the exact same name as my freshly restored Home folder, this message pops up:
In other words: the Home folder is already there on the drive, but MacOS just hasn't "seen" it yet, so all I needed to do was press the above "Use existing folder" button, and after doing its thing I could log out of my current user, then into the newly restored user.
So that's great to know, and has worked fine on that Mac with single 2TB SSD for users, MacOS and apps.
But what about a dual-drive system?
In my Mid-2010 Mac Pro I have Home folders separated from MacOS, on physically separate drives like this:
Drive #1: 1 TB SSD (for MacOS and apps)
Drive #2: 10 TB hard drive (for Home folders)
That Mac has currently got MacOS 10.13.6 High Sierra, but like with the Macbook Pro I'd also like to do a clean install of 10.14 Mojave on it. But if possible without having to restore the Home folders (there's a lot of large files there and it would take a long time to restore). Having discovered the above, how could I apply that to a dual drive system without messing things up?
Obviously, if I just create a new user with the same name as the Home folder it'll do that -but on the SSD (as that's the boot-drive with MacOS on it).
The only other way I can think of is the following, but I'm unsure if this will somehow mess up things:
1) Create a new user with the exact same name as the Home-folder (which will create a new user on the SSD with that same name)
2) Got to the "Advanced options" (in the "Users & groups" system preference, right-click on the newly created user), then click on the "Choose" button next to where it says "Home directory:" where I select the Home-folder on the 10 TB hard drive. This is the same method I used to relocate my Home folders off the SSD to begin with, using DigiLloyd's Mac Performance guide: relocating the Home directory off the boot drive method)
My guess is at that stage I would get the same alert window asking if I want to "Use existing folder" (see my first screenshot), but since I didn't actually copy the newly created user over from the SSD as in DigiLloyd's instructions I'd get into trouble with differing user ID/UUID. Does anyone know if this is a legit way of doing it, or if there's a different method to go by?
I also don't know why my Apple-ID comes up (maybe because I'm currently logged in with it?) and why there is as "Aliases" entry at the bottom as I never put in anything there.