Windows user directories have domain suffix?

Question

The users on some of our servers used to have user directories named the following:

C:\Users\[username]

Since the infrastructure admin did something to "refresh" the user accounts, a bunch of new directories got created named:

C:\Users\[username].[domain]

... where [domain] is the domain you login to windows with, like MYDOMAIN\username. What would cause Windows to change to these new directory names? It has obviously meant that the user data has gotten reset, though the old directories are still there. Is there a way we can restore the old ones?

Answer 1

When Windows tries to create user profile folder (matching username) and the folder already exists, but belongs to another user (with different SID) the system tries to append the domain name. If the username.domain folder exists too, then the system tries to append a three digit counter like username.domain.000.

Since the infrastructure admin did something to "refresh" the user accounts

I assume that the user accounts have been deleted and re-created. At the same time they had to get a new SID (back to the old SID in AD is not possible, except that the recovery from the Recycle Bin if it was enabled, or through an authoritative restore) and most of the access rights to the old directories.

You can easily test this: Open the Security tab in the properties of one of the old user folders - if the SID is displayed instead of the name of the user who was folder owner, then my guess is correct.