User Profiles for Web Browsers - Part I

This Post will take you through the steps on creating separate user profiles for different users of a common PC or a Laptop that is used by all the family members.

Yeah I can hear you saying "What is the need for a Separate Profile?" or "What is a User Profile?"


Let me answer these Questions before taking you through the steps.


User Profiles


We use User Profiles for User specific Data Storage and Settings. Or Simply put, you can have a user profile in your computer to have your documents, pictures, music, videos etc., for you. You can configure the desktop wallpaper and resolution that suits you. Put shortcuts of the Applications you use frequently to the desktop and you can also customize you start menu.


Meanwhile you can create create a separate User profile for your kids and family members so that they don't meddle with your official documents in your My Documents or change your Preferences like wallpaper.


User Profiles for Web Browsers


Why do we need Profiles for Browsers, anyway?


The answer is simple. Each one of us have different preferences and different patterns of browsing while browsing the internet. You may not want to share it with others or you may want your Browsing History and Bookmarks to be organized and you don't want that to be mixed with browsing data of others who are using your computer.




Now let us see how we can create profiles for different Browsers.


Internet Explorer

 There is no Specific option for creating a separate User profile in IE. But you can maintain a Separate login for individual users using your PC in your Windows operating system. Windows creates a Separate Browser(IE) preferences Folder for every user you create in Windows. This can be tedious, at times, because you will have to completely logout of the User profile you are working on and then login to a new User.


Mozilla Firefox

In Firefox, creating or modifying a User profile is made very simple compared to other browsers. To manage profiles in Firefox, first you will have to close all the Firefox windows. Then Click the Start button and click Run. If Run command is not available in start menu, simply press the Windows key + R on the keyboard. In the Run dialog box type "firefox.exe -ProfileManager" without the quote.

Click OK. Now you should get a dialog similar to the one given below.

Remove the tick mark in the Don't ask at startup check box. Now every-time you click on a firefox shortcut you will be provided with a dialog box like this so that you can select the necessary profile and start Firefox by clicking Start Firefox button.

Click create profile to create a profile. Click Next in the first page of the Wizard that comes up and in the Second page type the Profile name.

You also have an option to select the path for the Profile. This is the location where Firefox stores all your personal data. Click Finish and the new user will be listed in the Choose User Profile window.

You can also use this procedure to troubleshoot problems in Firefox as the new profile will not have any of the addons that you have installed in the previous user.


I will explain about User Profiles in Google Chrome in my next post as we will have to do some manual configuration in Chrome and So I am going to dedicate a complete Post for Chrome's User Profile.


To be continued................




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