QNAP User, Admin, and Group Accounts

[@jamegrabham9992]

Great video Mike...thank you... I have had 2 QNAP Nas for years... never understood home or homes...:( I do now... why delete the original "admin" account? and set "Newadmin"? Is it because of a different user name???

[@MikeFaucher]

You were not alone not understanding Home and Homes, it is confusing at first. You can't delete the admin only disable it. The main reason is that it is default. Much more secure not to use defaults. Thanks for the feedback.

[@donsylvester5275]

Hi Mike. Interested in your feedback on 'best practice' for handling the "local USB Backup HD" during an upgrade of system disks. I think upgrade of 'System' disks will usually require new, matching increase in size of local USB Backup HD? I already have a WD 4TB External USB drive for nightly backup with HBS and so I have a full backup of my existing 4TB NAS system there. I think I should do the following steps in this order: 1. Eject the existing WD External 4 TB USB backup drive and keep it as a "safety" backup. 2. Attach my new 12TB Seagate External drive (USB connection) and adjust the HBS jobs to point to this new backup drive. I'm not sure what to expect when I attach this new drive?? 3. Do a full backup of my existing 4TB RAID 1 system onto it and keep that new 12 TB backup drive attached to the system. 4. Upgrade the 4TB HD's in the system to the planned new 10TB drives with RAID 1. 5. Then, after I have upgraded the system with the new 10 TB HD's, the HBS will NOT reformat the new 12 TB Seagate External drive because it was attached and the HBS jobs set up before the system 10 TB HD upgrades. It will keep the backup done of the original 4TB system data and just continue its scheduled nightly backups (Sync's) onto that new 12TB External Seagate drive. Is that reasonable?? Want your thoughts before I start process. This might be a subject you could cover in one of your videos?

[@MikeFaucher]

Sounds about right. With regards to #5, USB drives are not reformatted as they are not part of the pool. Since you are doing a drive replacement one by one, I would not even have the USB attached when you are doing the drive swaps. After your backup, safely eject the USB drive and do your swaps. Make sure HBS jobs are temporarily disabled as the drive swaps will take a couple of days.

[@donsylvester5275]

Really appreciate your inputs!! And glad I asked you, because a QNAP Support person told me that when I first attached the new 12 TB Backup HD it would be formatted. I'm betting you're right and they're wrong. Thx for suggestion on ejecting the new Backup HD while doing swaps. Disabling the HBS jobs makes perfect sense because the total upgrade time will overrun the daily Backup Jobs. FYI: While adjusting my new Login ID I found it couldn't "see" my SD card reader, with pics/videos for transfer, in the File Manager app when plugged into the front USB. I had to plug it in then use original 'admin' ID to give the new ID 'Permission' to R/W that SD card reader item. I think that's a weird, non-intuitive situation that will trip up many non-tech users.

[@MikeFaucher]

@@donsylvester5275 That is strange. One viewer had to re-enable, then disable, then reboot to get things to work.

[@paco3447]

I have noticed that a main limitation regarding alternate administrators group accounts is that, unlike default admin account, it does not list QNAP and affiliates store in AppCenter (only already installed ones). Thus won't allow installing apps from within QNAP's interface (just only and exclusively under built-in's default root admin account).

[@MikeFaucher]

I am not seeing that characteristic. I see all the apps from the app store when logged in under my new admin account. Interesting that you are seeing this as that is certainly not the way it is supposed to be.

[@paco3447]

Well, it seems a bug. Just re-enabling the admin account, logging out... then logging as admin, opening the app center, logging out and finally logging back in to the alternate administrators group account seems to do the trick. Then you can disable the root admin account again.

[@paco3447]

@@MikeFaucher Yep. Quite strange. Anyway, the steps I’ve mentioned in my own response did the trick.

[@MikeFaucher]

@@paco3447 Awesome. Thanks for letting me know.

[@Albert-yv2ue]

Normal users also can see the homes folder, because they all belong to everyone group. I am not being able to achieve how a normal user to only see its home folder and anything more. Do you have any idea what can be done ?

[@MikeFaucher]

I prefer to disable that feature and create folders manually for each user. This way it is less confusing and the naming can be more meaningful. I have not used home folders since my first NAS. Other NAS suppliers such as TerraMaster use only a single layer which I prefer, but as a long time QNAP user, I found the dedicated folder to be the best approach for the users. Hope that helps.

[@donsylvester5275]

EXCELLENT Mike. Question: What exactly is the "User's Data" that will deleted when I delete that User? My fear is that QNAP means all the data, pics and videos for example, that I've been so carefully storing while using that User ID? I'm afraid to delete the original "admin" account because the system msg says that all the "admin's data" will be deleted. Might just be a wording confusion but that's super scary. Pls explain why my fear is misguided?

[@MikeFaucher]

So first, you cant dont delete the admin account only disable it. When you delete a standard user you only delete anything that is in their HOME folder. If you want to keep either don't check the delete data when deleting a user or move the data from that users home folder to somewhere else. It does not delete the entire NAS or shared folders just the HOME folder for that user. Hope that helps.

[@donsylvester5275]

Thank you Mike. MUCH appreciated. I seem to have 3 ID's in my system - 1st is 'admin', 2nd is called 'support', 3rd is the new one I made but failed to properly create in the Administrator Group by my own mishandling. I wanted to delete that 3rd ID and try again ... so I looked in the HOMES folder and there is no data at all in the HOME folder of any of the 3 IDs? Is that normal? What data should I find there for any ID? How does that info get there? Sorry to be puzzled by such basic stuff ... but I'm a "low-tech" NAS user.

[@MikeFaucher]

@@donsylvester5275 The reason there is no data is because it was not put there. This is a user folder. Even the folder won't show up unless you log in as that user. You should be able to delete the support user which I assume QNAP did for you at some point, modify the new user to be an admin (or delete and create a new one), then disable the default admin account in that order. I hope that helps.