Why you shouldnt store files on your desktop?

Over the years, I’ve repaired many computers. Most people just ask me to speed it up. I usually ensure they have enough RAM to run the latest version of OS X, update everything, clean out some caches if the hard drive is near full, and advise they reorganize things. 

I usually don’t have to mention the Desktop, unless it’s really bad. And I’ve seen some bad ones. Hundreds of little icons. These people have adjusted the icon size to 16x16 pixels just to fit it all on the display. The thing is, they probably don’t know how much it slows down their Mac. 

In this tutorial, I’ll outline several reasons why you need to keep the Desktop clear  and explain how to do it more effectively.

Quick Look and Icons

Quick Look is one of my favorite features in OS X. It allows you to select an item and preview it with a quick tap of the spacebar. There are many different file types supported, from MP3 and AAC to JPEG and MP4.

While Quick Look is a fantastic tool to have, it will be your enemy if you keep Pages or Word documents, images, videos, music with artwork, and anything else it supports previewing on the Desktop. 

The tool is always ready with previews, so when you have a lot of documents on the Desktop, all those previews will have to be temporarily stored in the RAM. This means your Mac can become extremely slow.

Having all these thumbnails in the RAM slowed my Mac to a halt.

You may not have even noticed your computer slowing down, possibly because it happened over time as you added more items to the Desktop. It may be worth a quick experiment of moving all that stuff to see if the speed improves.

Moving Files Off the Desktop

1. Begin by creating a new folder on the Desktop, either by clicking File and selecting New Folder or pressing Command-Shift-N. Name it something fitting like Old Desktop and press enter.
2. Select all the files on the Desktop, either by clicking Edit, Select All or using the keyboard shortcut, Command-A. Deselect the folder you just created by holding the Command key and clicking it.
3. Drag and drop all the files into the folder. Wait for them to copy.
4. Move the folder to the user’s Documents folder by dragging and dropping it to the sidebar link in Finder titled Documents.
5. Restart the Mac and evaluate the difference.

There should have been a noticeable improvement in your computer’s speed, especially in Finder’s operation. If not, at least you did something with all those files. Well, at least for now. Next I’ll go over some additional organizational tactics for the files.

The File System

Merlin Mann mentioned on an episode of 5by5’s Back to Work podcast that many people don’t understand the concept of a file system, so they drop everything on the Desktop.

Then, when it becomes too cluttered, they move it all into a folder appropriately titled Old Desktop. The cycle continues until they’ve created folders within those Old Desktop folders to accommodate their need to work on different projects. At this point, they’ve actually created the file system they found confusing.

In truth, putting things on your Desktop because it’s easy is not a sound, productive or organizational strategy. In fact, it’s one of the messiest ways to store things on the Mac.

Apple gave you folders like Documents, Music, and Pictures for a reason. There’s no need to create your own.

Tidy, but it still shouldn't be on the desktop.

It may be worth spending a few hours going through what’s on the Desktop, moving things to their respective locations. Pictures from a certain month or event should be in a folder with the respective name. It’ll be far easier to find them later. 

The same goes for documents that pertain to a specific project. You don’t need to be searching the entire computer for something in the future when you can take a few solid organizational measures now.

If you like having things one click away, you could change the folder that Finder opens to by default.

1. Launch Finder
2. Click Finder and select Preferences.
3. In the General tab, look for the drop-down below New Finder windows show and select one of the available options, or Other to use a custom folder.

Additionally, you could drag some of your most used folders to the right side of the Dock [near the trash can] to pin them there for quick browsing.

Organized Computing

In this tutorial I’ve shown you how to keep the Desktop tidy. I’ve explained how things can get unnecessarily cluttered and slow down to nearly unusable levels if you let the Desktop run rampant. 

Now the battery life will last longer, the computer will be faster, Finder won’t hate you, and so on. In addition, it’s always good to keep things on the Mac organized in individual folders. It takes a while to adapt to, but in the end you will be able to show people photos from that road trip last spring much faster.

Your computer’s Desktop is the easiest place to save images, text documents, recent downloads, and any other kind of file. But while it seems easy and convenient to save that file there where you know you can find it again, here are three reasons why you shouldn’t:

Why You Shouldn’t Save Files to Your Desktop

1. Files stored on the Desktop can actually slow down the computer’s overall performance.
2. Your Desktop will eventually run out of visible space which actually makes it more difficult to locate the file you need. Some of you may have already run out of Desktop space.
3. Most importantly, the files on your Desktop at this very minute have probably not been backed up and are vulnerable—they may be easily deleted. If they are important enough to be quickly accessible, they should be backed up and stored in a folder nested within your “My Documents” folder or elsewhere on your computer.

Folders and Shortcuts.

Folders are a great way to organize files without taking up all your Desktop space. Create folders for different projects, publications, or file types. You will also want to store your folders and files in a location that is safe, but can still be accessed easily. You can easily do this by creating  Desktop shortcuts to your folders and files.

Here’s how:

Let’s pretend you have a folder on your Desktop called Publication Resources that contains several Microsoft Publisher documents for your publication. You will first store this file in a more secure location, then create a shortcut to it.

1. Right-click on the folder and choose “Cut”
2. Open your My Documents folder [in Vista, Windows 7 and Windows 8.x, it is just called “Documents”]
3. In an empty area of the My Documents folder, right click and choose “Paste.” Now your Publication Resources folder has been moved from the Desktop to the My Documents folder.
4. In the My Documents folder, find the Publication Resource folder that you just moved. Right-click it and choose “Send to > Desktop [create shortcut].”
5. Close the My Documents folder and go back to your Desktop. You should see a new icon there called “Shortcut to Publication Resources” or “Publication Resources – Shortcut.”

So whenever you need to open that folder, you can just double click the shortcut on the Desktop and it will open just like it always did. The difference is that the shortcut on your Desktop is only a shortcut—the actual file is stored safely in your “My Documents” folder.

Shortcuts are a nifty feature. They work for both files and folders. Use them to declutter your Desktop and safeguard your valuable information.

[Adapted from The Computer Tutor]