5

Right now I have a Mac Mini. I migrated macbook pro data from a time machine, but I didn't do it from the beginning of my startup. I used the migration assistance to migrate the data. However, I'm getting my macbook pro name in my terminal command line, why is that?

Name-Macbook-Pro:~ name$

Why am i getting this? I'm on my Mac Mini, I guess its from the migration but will it affect anything else? How do I change this?

Ian C.
  • 45,969
hellomello
  • 283

1 Answers1

10

That part of the prompt is the hostname (\h) by default. Normally changing the computer name from System Preferences also changes the hostname:

The settings are stored in /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/preferences.plist:

<key>Network</key>
<dict>
    <key>HostNames</key>
    <dict>
        <key>LocalHostName</key>
        <string>Lauris-iMac</string>
    </dict>
</dict>
<key>System</key>
<dict>
    <key>ComputerName</key>
    <string>Lauri’s iMac</string>
    <key>ComputerNameEncoding</key>
    <integer>0</integer>
</dict>

This changes the system hostname:

sudo scutil --set HostName My-MacMini

It adds <key>HostName</key><string>My-MacMini</string> under System. If the system hostname has been set, changing the computer name or local hostname from System Preferences won't change the prompt.

Lri
  • 105,117
  • 1
    +1; I conclude that there's no good reason to ever set HostName (despite what man hostname says!), given that its value is then out of sync with the LocalHostName value set via System Preferences. Conversely, LocalHostName is also recognized by hostname. To put it another way: if you want to change the hostname from a shell, use BOTH sudo scutil --set LocalHostName newName and sudo scutil --set ComputerName newName, where the ComputerName value can be a friendlier version (spaces, punctuation) of the LocalHostName value (alphanumerics and dashes only). – mklement0 May 05 '14 at 04:28
  • 2
    To get rid of a HostName entry, set its value to an empty string (this effectively removes the key from the .plist file): sudo scutil --set HostName ''. – mklement0 May 05 '14 at 04:31