Forum Discussion

ctviggen's avatar
ctviggen
Copper Contributor
Apr 13, 2024

Onedrive has the desktop for my computer? Why?

So, I saw that there was a folder on my OneDrive for Desktop for my home computer.  I deleted that folder....and lost everything that was on Desktop for my home computer.  I was able to restore the desktop to OneDrive, then cut everything from there and paste it into Desktop on my computer

 

But why would the Desktop folder be on OneDrive?  I have not enable ANY backups.  How do I prevent this from happening?

files
Sync

3 Replies

  • Mike Williams's avatar
    Mike Williams
    Iron Contributor
    Apr 13, 2024
    Look at the settings for OneDrive. Redirected folder backup for Desktop, My Documents and My Pictures has been a standard feature for a decade .it is incredibly well documented.

    Don't manually delete folders and move them around. You will lose files.
    • ctviggen's avatar
      ctviggen
      Copper Contributor
      Apr 14, 2024

      Mike WilliamsThank you. The settings for "Back up folders on this PC" has "Desktop" not backed up.  I did not realize that Documents and Pictures were being backed up, so I turned those off.  (I have a NAS in my house where I store those and don't store anything on this computer.)

       

      So, if the Desktop is not supposed to be being backed up...why is it being backed up?  Is there a way to fix this? 

      • Mike Williams's avatar
        Mike Williams
        Iron Contributor
        Apr 19, 2024
        At this point you have manually interfered with the standard settings so much I can't predict what is going on. You either need someone with expertise to look at it, or - having properly backed up all your files somewhere else than your current device or OneDrive - reset OneDrive completely, ensure you don't have multiple Desktop folders and start over.

        Cleaning up is much harder than breaking things.

Resources