User Name and Music Library Directory Fused Together (Awkwardly)

I was messing with my user directory a long time ago, trying to reassign libraries to my second hard drive D:/. I don't remember if I used the command line or some library customization program (which I can't find anymore when I search for one). I'd moved some libraries from C: to D: and back, and might have messed with the User directory some how too. Current situation is that the User Account labels its directory Music, but deeper in the system it shows the correct Two Word user name as the directory it is using (at least its using the correct User Name directory for some things, and the Music library name for most display instances).

My user name directory has Two Words. It can not be seen in File explorer.
File explorer shows the Music library as the user name.

The Music library directory displays user specific files such as all the other libraries and App Data, so; the Music library is pointing to the wrong directory.

Properties of my music library folder show both directories:



When I try to change the music library location it gives this error:

"Can't move the folder because there is a folder in the same location that can't be redirected. Access is denied".

Another view:


Can it be fixed?

Before re-installing Windows, try adding another user account and copy the files you want from the current one to the new. You will lose personalisations (various settings), but that would also be the case with a re-install. Once the new account is working, you can delete the messed-up one.

Thank you for your suggestion, unfortunately; I do in deed want to untangle this issue without reinstalling windows.

I've made a great effort to customize my install and believe that "fixed" versions of windows itself, would only restore and solidify the intrusive obtrusions which I've spent a couple years eliminating. I do not know what I would have to do to get back to this happy stasis, but; it wouldn't be the cat's meow.

I was hoping for a registry edit or whatever. Thank you though.

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Eventually I might resort to a fresh account, but... again, it's really just a single folder that has two different names. We may not know how to find and edit it yet, but once we do, it can't be that difficult to fix can it? There's got to be a list, a name and directory matching list... some sort of... registry?

Or, maybe it's two different folders, using the same directory?

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Maybe I can turn off the error that checked if it was allowed to "move" the folder target location? If I could turn off the error, then I could move the Music library with no error, and rename the user folder with no error. As it is, if I try to make the Two Word user name folder which we can't see but it still lists as in use (a new folder under C:/Users with the Two Word user name) then it mysteriously vanishes the new Two Word folder. It's as if the folder is there but is being masked with the Music name, thus you can only create folders that have different names, similar to what you were saying about a new account. New User name folder? no problem, just don't give it the same Two Word name that Music is locked on to.

Thinking I had an idea how you got into this mess, I created a new user 'xxx;, and deliberately tried to relocate the music folder to the top level "C:\users\xxx" folder (the profile folder), but was met with resistance: first, a warning:

and when I persisted, a 'no can do':

So Windows really want to protect me from myself! I relocated the music folder somewhere harmless, then look in the registry for thet harmless location, which I found referred to in two places (not recorded) - I deliberately changed the two reg entries to the 'xxx' profile folder, and logged out and in: this had the effect of changing the name of my music folder under the profile to 'xxx', but otherwise broke nothing. Not surprisingly, Windows won't let me change the name of the profile folder.

So I don't know how you got yourself into such a pickle, and thus know of no way out. Sorry! Good luck - Martin

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/wi.../naming-a-file

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/tr...quotation-mark

I'm trying to follow the instructions in @Bree's final link. We are on right track that's clear.

My question is about step 7

7. You can now edit both {0DDD015D-B06C-45D5-8C4C-F59713854639} and My Pictures to point to %USERPROFILE%\Pictures

Which, in my case, would be My Music which I should change to %USERPROFILE%\Music, and; what? Which is the second one? Is there another one in that list to change?

Okay! Done and done. That worked great!
Changing those two registry entries and a restart got my Two Word user name folder to reappear in the Users folder. ✓
The Music folder is back to thinking it's Music and not pretending it's a user folder. ✓
X - Some of my program icons have vanished! Snipping tool, WordPad, and my browser. The browser had a custom icon which came back when I opened the browser, but; the Windows programs did not restore their icons when I opened them.
X - The Music folder which I created new from scratch doesn't have the usual library icons, but I can set that manually (I won't have to as you'll see).

Did I misplace the desktop.ini file?

I had put the desktop.ini into the Music folder. I have now moved it out of Music and into the Two Word user name folder. Restarted it for a second time.

Now, I see the Music folder has automatically reset its icons; and now looks like the standard library icons you'd expect. By all user indications I assume it is now functioning fully -- as it was before all this began.

So what happened to Windows' programs WordPad and Snipping Tool, both of which continue to show blank paper icons in the Start Menu. Icons in the left scrolling-menu list (Alphabetical Start menu) do show, and WordPad .txt files do show the word pad icon. I tried to unpin them from Start, and repin them from the list that has working icons. It didn't work. Start menu pins are blank icons.

Right click > More> Open file location I see a folder full of shortcuts which all have working icons. So Start Menu pins for some Windows programs are broken by this fix. Stymied.

Other than that; we're peachy keen over here.