How i relocate folders like Program files, profiles, etc

[Sirex]

Today i've been redoing my pc, and as I as doing my usual relocating my directories off my C: to my data drive...
I thought... why not share some of my lil things I do...

I store my windows profile off on a seperate disk from the others, for the fact I store that much stuff in it, keeping it on the system disk is not efficent.

First a few things I do when installing windows.
My drives are actually partitioned like such (physically in this order):
d: [Data and stuffs] is the first partition, why? outside of the disc, faster
e: [my profile and shared documents] I keep this on a sepeate partition, no real reason but for isolation
c: [system] 15gb contains only windows and 1-2 profiles (admin and scott's)

Like i said e: is really not essentual but I like it like that.

I'll explain how i moved those 'extra' things in second.
The things I 'relocate' are actually these
c:\program files\
c:\documents and settings\Sirex
c:\documents and settings\all users\documents

First let me explain a few things here, you will have to do program files in safemode
You CAN NOT relocate the entire documents and settings with out loading the drive in another windows install
you must be using NTFS
relocated folders look like they are actually on that place but dont count towards your space or expand it (count wise)

OK so get this here
Junction v1.05

Junction from sysinternals, these guys are good, they used to be a sepearte company, but they did so much with windows API that MS now have them in house.

OK now you have that, put it in c: best place, its easier to work with there.

Boot into safe mode, (dont have to if you want to not move program files)
Login as Admin
Not the profile you want to relocate, as your NTUSER.DAT file will be locked.
This is also the reason you cant relocate the entire docset folder, system profiles you know XD

OK so lets start with a user.
vista its c:\users\
Create the folder where you want it to be in my case its
e:\Sirex
goto c:\documents and settings\Sirex
cut everything from there to e:\sirex [the folder must be emptied]

once everything is there and the orig folder is empty
Start > Run [winkey+r < vista's do this]
type cmd
now use this command
c:\junction "C:\documents and settings\Sirex\" "e:\Sirex\"
put your paths in " "'s saves issues

now in windows explorer go back to the docset location, you will see all the files again.
tada! magic pointer

to move the shared documents do the same thing but only on this folder
c:\documents and settings\all users\documents\
I find this handy as it puts my share in a larger drive while keeping my system drive at the back and small.

Now program files, same idea as above, except you do a few extra steps.
Doing these extra things alone won't do the job, a junction will.
So make d:\program files\
Move c stuff to d one
junction "c:\program files\" "d:\program files"

Now additionally to prevent issues later on in life and to make things nicer for installers
start > run
regedit
find your way to
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\Curr entVersion
In there you will see 2 values we want to fiddle with
Adjust CommonFilesDir to your new location + \Common Files
Adjust ProgramFilesDir to your new location

Now all the installers that do their job will have d:\program files\ automatically.

This is ment to change the things for windows's lil preinstalled stuff, from expeience overtime i've noticed it does not work quite as good as it should, which is why i now junction off the folder.

Is a few other things I do, esp on a reinstall like i import my old registry and transplant entries from it into the new one.
My firefox and thunderbird profiles are not in my user profile but in a sepeate folder (this also mean when i use other pc's on the network i can use the same settings and extensions easy, and access my email from any pc, same settings)

If i remember any other little things I do to make things easier, or that (well least for me) i'll post them up for you all to have a look at
Its good to share info like this

Like i said this will work for any folder, as long as its empty.
So for those 'OMG it installs in my c:\program files\ and i had no choice" things
You have one now, you can force it off your c drive!

btw you can remove junctions by using junction -d "p:\ath\to"

[mapes]

Weeee a symlink it's nice to see Microsoft has finally caught up with 1970's Unix filesystem features

[WalkinTarget]

Doesn't TweakUI do the same thing essentially ? Just give it a different location for your 'My Documents' folder or any other common folder.

I set up all of the work PCs to redirect the user's home folder from its local location to the users network home folder.

[Sirex]

na its totally different.
even thou i do change the 'where program files is' to save confusion

What this does is actually points c:\program files\
to any folder transparently, you could not even tell it was on another drive.

So even if something wanted c:\program files, it effectivly forces it to install on d:\program files

Best way to describe it, even mounted a partition into a folder from disk management?
its like that but folder to folder, and tells windows to read folder X instead of folder Y

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NTFS_junction_point

[WalkinTarget]

Ahhh, thanks for the clarification on that, Sirex !! Duly noted !

[Sirex]

Reason I do it, i discovered junctions back in 2005 i think it was.
I dont like things other than my os on my c:
its easier if i reinstall over the top if something goes wrong as its not wiping out things i've installed.
esp my user profile, because its safe on another disk.
When I format only the junction is lost, and not the data.

If you really wanted to go futher you could do things like preformat a drive, junction off things like %WINDIR%\config which is where your regisistry is stored and event logs etc and other more critical folders.

But thats really overkill unless you want to keep those things on a seperate HDD for some reason or another.

Can do docset folder if you preformat a drive essentually..

Has its uses, like for example, I accidently installed something on my c: by mistake, this thing is a pain to install so i dont really want to have to install twice.
So i moved it from c: to where I wanted it in the first place, and just used a junction to remap it.

Yeah reinstalling is an option but this thing has like a zillion install pages... 2mins moving it over 30mins installing?

[Duke{CLR}]

This is good stuff. I am constantly trying how to keep my OS partition clean. I will read up on this when I get some free time.

BTW how do you get steam to download and install games on another drive?

[Sirex]

I've not found anything in the settings or a reg entry,
this would do the trick easy just map steamapps to where you want it to go...

I know you used to beable to tell steam to install the files else where but they seem to have taken that out of it.

I usually just install steam into the game files folder.

[Sirex]

Word of warning, before someone does this...

NEVER delete a junction in explorer, ie my computer
if you mapped c:\folder to d:\folder
if you delete c:\folder in my computer, it will recurse (ie follow)
into d:\folder and remove all those pretty lil files you have in there

Vista does not have that issue, because ms implemented junctions better, but XP does this so watch out!