double my documents

the reason for this is that the 'my documents' icon on your desktop is not
an actual folder, but rather it is a shortcut that is actually pointing to
the 'my documents' folder in your profile folder (c:\documents and
settings\jonathan\jonathan's documents), but, since it does not have the
telltale arrow that normally appears on shortcuts, one may become confused
(this is not a regular shortcut - it is a system shortcut that works a bit
differently than normal shortcuts). You can confirm this by right clicking
the 'my documents' icon on your desktop and selecting 'properties' - under
"target folder location" you will see a path that refers to this folder that
you said the duplicate files were being created. the reason for this is that
windows xp is designed to be used by multiple users and to keep each user's
settings and documents separated so there are no conflicts, the place these
settings and documents are stored is in what is known as a user "profile".
each user of a machine is assigned his/her own profile, and all profiles are
stored in the appropriately named "documents and settings" folder. test this
by creating a new user account, logging on as this user, then looking in the
'documents and settings' folder - you will see a new subfolder named the
name of the new user. if you want certain files/folders to be available to
all users of the computer, then place them in the 'shared documents' folder
(this folder is, again, only a shortcut; it points to "c:\documents and
settings\all users\documents").

Dan DeStefano


"Jonathan" wrote in message
...
Everything I save in amy folder in My Documents is also
created and saved in a parallel folder within My
Computer - Jonathans documents/My documents - this is of
no use to me as I don't share the computer and I am
presumably using twice the memory (if I search for a file
I find 2 of everything). I tried to delete the parallel
files (Jonathan's documents) but the originals (My
documents)disappeared as well. I tried amending my User
accounts - but could not delete Jonathan withoutmaking
another account the controlling one - which I presume
would contine the problem under another account name. Any
suggestions?

the reason for this is that the 'my documents' icon on your desktop is not
an actual folder, but rather it is a shortcut that is actually pointing to
the 'my documents' folder in your profile folder (c:\documents and
settings\jonathan\jonathan's documents), but, since it does not have the
telltale arrow that normally appears on shortcuts, one may become confused
(this is not a regular shortcut - it is a system shortcut that works a bit
differently than normal shortcuts). You can confirm this by right clicking
the 'my documents' icon on your desktop and selecting 'properties' - under
"target folder location" you will see a path that refers to this folder that
you said the duplicate files were being created. the reason for this is that
windows xp is designed to be used by multiple users and to keep each user's
settings and documents separated so there are no conflicts, the place these
settings and documents are stored is in what is known as a user "profile".
each user of a machine is assigned his/her own profile, and all profiles are
stored in the appropriately named "documents and settings" folder. test this
by creating a new user account, logging on as this user, then looking in the
'documents and settings' folder - you will see a new subfolder named the
name of the new user. if you want certain files/folders to be available to
all users of the computer, then place them in the 'shared documents' folder
(this folder is, again, only a shortcut; it points to "c:\documents and
settings\all users\documents").

Dan DeStefano


"Jonathan" wrote in message
...
Everything I save in amy folder in My Documents is also
created and saved in a parallel folder within My
Computer - Jonathans documents/My documents - this is of
no use to me as I don't share the computer and I am
presumably using twice the memory (if I search for a file
I find 2 of everything). I tried to delete the parallel
files (Jonathan's documents) but the originals (My
documents)disappeared as well. I tried amending my User
accounts - but could not delete Jonathan withoutmaking
another account the controlling one - which I presume
would contine the problem under another account name. Any
suggestions?