Moved main directories to external drive

[rctneil]

Hey,

My internal drive on my iMac was filling up big time so I purchased 2 3tb external USB3 drives.

One to store my data on and the other to be a mirrored backup.

I replicated my folder hierarchy on the external like so:

<username>/Documents
/Movies
/Pictures
/Music

I have moved the contents of these folders from the internal onto the external and updated applications to point to the new file locations.

The issue I have now is how can I get OSX to show the new Documents folder when showing a save as dialog? or similar. I would rather not use symbolic links for this.

Also, Can I get my new Documents etc folders on my external drive to have the snazzy folder icons?

 

[benwiggy]

Each app will show a different location for the save dialog, usually the location that was used last time.
You shouldn't get the home folder (or Documents) in every Open and Save dialog.

If you don't want to use sym links, then essentially, you're just using other folders, and the system will still use the default folders when it needs to.

The alternative is to move the entire user account to the external, which can be done by right-clicking on the user in System Preferences > Users & Groups, selecting "Advanced Options" and changing the location.
Note that if the external isn't available, OS X will create a new empty user home at the default /Users/ location, leading to "where are all my files and prefs?".

 

[rctneil]

Ok, Makes sense, Thanks. I'd rather not move the user to the external drive and would rather keep the external drive just as a storage drive.

I guess i'll leave everything just as it is as it seems to be working nicely.

 

[satcomer]

To move your iTunes Library to an external read/watch the blog post How to move an iTunes library to an external drive.

To move an iPhoto Library follow the Apple article iPhoto '11: Move your iPhoto library to a new location.

Moving these two things will save a lot of space on a SSD drive. Just make sure you clone that external with all you media to another drive for safety's sake.