How to get home folder to point to Sandbox

[MarcP]

I'm running OSX 10.5.4 from a Sandbox, I also have a Superduper volume (MAC HD clone). My Home folder which is shown in the Finder sidebar is pointing to the Users directory in my Superduper drive. How do I get it to point to the Sandbox/Users directory instead?

[dnanian]

Did you base your Sandbox on your Backup rather than your startup volume, or were you running from the backup when you created your Sandbox?

[MarcP]

As far as I remember I followed the instructions and based my Sandbox on the MAC HD. Is it worth updating MAC HD with my current Sandbox and then restoring Sandbox from that?

[dnanian]

Open your Sandboxed Home folder by starting at the top of the Sandbox, then going to /Users, then your account name, then create a new folder in the Desktop folder.

Check on your desktop to see if it appears. Then, check to see if it appears in the Desktop folder of /Users/your-account/Desktop on the "real" original drive, or the backup.

[MarcP]

Okay I did that. Result:

No show of "Test Folder " on Desktop

No show of "Test Folder " in MAC HD/User/Account/Desktop folder

Test folder only appears in Sandbox.

[dnanian]

Only in Sandbox? That doesn't make sense, since Sandbox doesn't store your desktop at all. You mean on the backup?

[MarcP]

I did a screen capture to show the file structure of the various drives.

http://data5.blog.de/media/419/2691419_cdc4d79bfd_l.jpeg

There's nothing in the MAC HD Desktop folder, so that hasn't been expanded.

[dnanian]

That doesn't look like a Sandbox at all, Marc.

[MarcP]

So what do I do?

Checking my "About this MAC" It's showing that I'm booting from Superduper, which is a surprise to me because I thought I was booting from a Sandbox!

[dnanian]

Clearly not!

I don't know what "SuperDuper!" is, as a volume. Is it a backup you just made?

[MarcP]

It's a drive that I formatted. I labelled it "Sandbox" and then pointed to that when I created the Sandbox. i.e. I used that as my target destination.

[dnanian]

You labeled "SuperDuper!" (volume) "Sandbox"? But there are two volumes -- "SuperDuper!" and "Sandbox"...

[MarcP]

Sorry - that's confusing.

I've got a separate drive -Superdupder which is my MAC HD backup - as described in the first part of the user manual. Then I've got another separate drive labelled Sandbox which is what (until about 10 minutes ago) I thought I was booting and running from. This is what I've created following the advice in the "Creating a Sandbox" section of the manual.

Though it looks like I may have misunderstood something along the way.

[dnanian]

OK. The Sandbox you showed me a screen shot of doesn't look like it was created with a "Sandbox" script. If it was, your User folder would be a link to the main volume's folder, and it's not -- it looks like a regular folder.

The "Home" folder you're showing me is on something I can't see, but if you Cmd+Click the title bar of Finder it would show you the full path.

I just can't tell how you created these...

[MarcP]

The "Home Folder" is pointing to the Superduper drive. Which I guess makes sense if I'm actually booting from Superduper rather than Sandbox.


To resolve the problem should I format the current "Sandbox" drive and start again?

[dnanian]

Well, I don't know how long you've been running from "SuperDuper!". But, once you get your current startup volume correct, you should re-create your Sandbox, making sure to use the "Sandbox - shared users" or "Sandbox - shared users and applications" script.

(And don't forget to start up from it...)