Your Windows account at the Nicholas School uses a roaming profile. This profile stores default desktop settings - like wallpaper, colors, desktop shortcuts, bookmarks and printers - and any changes you make to those settings. Your profile gets downloaded from the server onto the local computer each time you login to the Nicholas network. When you log off, your profile - along with any changes - is uploaded to the server.

A smaller profile makes for less time logging in and off a machine and will cause less network traffic while it is downloading or uploading. For these reasons, it is preferable to have a small profile. Your profile should only contain shortcuts to data, whereas your Z: drive should actually contain all of your data.

Try the following to reduce the size of your profile and to speed up your login:

• Login to the Nicholas network. Make sure that you are not logged in on another computer at the same time.
• Double-click on My Computer on the desktop.
• Double-click on the C: drive.
• From the menu bar, click on Tools > Folder Options and select the View tab.
• Under Advanced Settings, click on Show hidden files and folders and close the window.
• You should be back at the C: drive window. Open the Documents and Settings folder.
• Open the file labeled with your username. This file is your profile.
• Remove any documents, presentations or data and store them in your home directory - your Z: drive - instead.

While in your profile directory, you can streamline your profile by doing the following:

• Click on the folder Cookies.
  • Be aware that removing the contents of this folder will delete any saved website passwords and any website auto-login features.
  • Delete everything in this folder you don't wish to save, except for the file named index.dat.
• Open Recent and delete everything in this folder.
• Go to Local Settings.
  
  • Open Temporary Internet Files and delete everything here.
  • Open Temp. Delete everything, unless you specifically saved things here (move those files to your home directory).
• Go back to your profile and open Application Data. If you use Mozilla or Netscape as your web browser, open the corresponding folder.
  • Open Profiles, then Default.
  • There should be at least one folder named with random letters and numbers. Open it (repeat the next step if there are multiple folders).
  • Open Cache. Delete everything in the folder.
• From the menu bar, click on Tools-Folder Options and select the View tab.
• Under Advanced Settings, click on Do not show hidden files and folders.
• Close all windows and empty the trash.

Log off and login again. It may take a little while to log off this first time as the changes to your profile are uploaded to the server, but your Windows profile should load more quickly on your next login.