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In praise of the junk folder
Merlin Mann | Sep 10 2004
I often end up using my Desktop as a parking lot for current files. Not exactly an inbox, but given how easy it is to hit “Junk,” my mounted drives, and my downloads folder are all I want to see permanently on the Desktop, so I label those items a certain color. When things start feeling a bit crufty, I open a new list-format Finder window showing the desktop, sort by color, and grab anything that’s not my permanent label color. I drag that all into the “Junk” directory, which I’ve set to do an automagic PsyncX backup to an external drive every night. That way, I can prune the local junk folder without ever worrying I’m throwing out something important. It’s more of a mental crutch than a really useful hack, but I find it an efficient way to deal with stuff I don’t want to devote much thought to. And, at least once a month, I do end up wanting something that I thought was “junk,” in which case I always know exactly where to look. [BTW: this is a classic TMTOWTDI: there are a bunch of OSX apps and Applescripts that can help you do this automatically. I just prefer this more hands-on way. Feel free to nominate your own cleanup tips in comments, of course.] 9 Comments
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![]() Not just for Mac users......Submitted by Cam (not verified) on September 10, 2004 - 12:10pm.
Not just for Mac users... although I started using a desktop folder called "cleanup" when I worked on OX 8, I've carried the practice over to my XP box as well... every so often, I drag the whole folder over to my firewire 80GB drive and start over again. It's amazing how much stuff I've wanted 6 months later can be found in those cleanup folders. » POSTED IN:
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