OS 8 showing OS 9 desktop folder

[jetboy_70]

I've installed OS X 10.4 Tiger, OS 8.6 and OS 9.2 on three different partitions on a G3 iMac. All clean installs from CD. If I place an alias on the desktop while in OS 8, it shows when I boot into OS 9. The same with OS 9 aliases showing in OS 8. From Tiger I can see that the aliases are in the correct Desktop Folders on the OS 8 and 9 partitions.

Can anyone explain what I'm seeing, and is there a way to disable it so OS 8 and OS 9 desktops function independently?

 

[Doq]

This is intentional functionality of the Classic Mac OS. When a disk is mounted, Finder will also parse its Desktop Folder and put anything in there on the desktop. Then, when the disk is unmounted, the desktop icons will go away as well.

From what I know and am aware of, the only way to disable this functionality is to unmount the volumes not being used. You'll have to do this on every boot though; unlike on OS X, there is no provision to have a volume be left unmounted.

 

[jetboy_70]

Thanks Doq. That makes sense. The last time I used OS 8/9 in anger was on a new beige G3 with a single drive and a single partition, so I've never seen this before. I've decided not to waste time trying to fight it, as I'd prefer to have the other partitions mounted.