Everything disappears, except for local drives. Weird. I have to open Finder to have them pop back on the desktop.
Um, a 'feature'?
Um, a 'feature'?
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Post 13.3 update bug? Files/folders on desktop disappear. š§
- Thread starter PinkyMacGodess
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Oh, not the contents of folders is disappearing too. I have to click on something in the left tool bar to get it back. Yikes...
what's happening? do you have docs & desktop on icloud, or on your mac? if folder contents are disappearing... try moving those folders to your docs folder (you can always put an alias for them on the desktop.
need more info, hard to gauge what's going on for you. also... have you rebooted?...
Just Documents folder, to my knowledge. I rebooted after the update. The folder that had the contents disappear/reappear isn't on iCloud either. Is this symptom related to iCloud for folders? Yikes...
this is happening in your Documents folder? just want to be sure i understand...
& what's disappeared? a file, a dozen files...? reboot again. then see if things are still missing, or disappearing. again, hard to tell what's happening from here. maybe someone else has ideas...
meanwhile, can you restore missing items from your backup? do they then stay where you put them?
Clarification: The icons all disappear, but the actual files are still there. I was sitting yesterday moments before my post, reading something in the second monitor (external) and glanced over after seeing something out of 'the corner of my eye' and the entire desktop was empty, except for the three icons of the main and two external drives. 'Oh, interesting' I thought, and tried to get the icons back. Finder was open on the left side, so I tried moving it, and then closed it and reopened it, and they popped back. Then, while in a folder looking for a file, I took a second to check something on my desk, and looked up as all of the icons in that folder disappeared. I moved the window around, and opened a new Finder window, and they popped back. It's just a little unnerving that they are just winking out. I wonder if they wink out for more than just the icons (they are just aliases for the real files), meaning if they wink out, can macOS still see them too. An interesting twist/thought. And if they do disappear to macOS? It's unlikely, but so is the desktop/Finder being so unstable to have icons just randomly disappearing. Hmm...
something related to the monitoring setup..? anyway, if they're just aliases, you are not, at least, in danger of losing actual files...
try changing some of the desktop view options, see if that fixes anything...
try changing some of the desktop view options, see if that fixes anything...
I can certainly relate to how perturbing this is. I experienced this a few months ago, I cannot remember exactly how long ago, and was greatly relieved when I clicked on the desktop and they all came back again. I have never experienced this since. This won't be any use for you other than for whatever reason this has happened to someone else before, totally unexpectedly and unexplained, and with me also not having done anything unusual or different to normal. All the best with getting through this.
edit: I think I might have actually done a restart for them to all come back - it was a while ago
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The happened to me again just now. All the icons on the desktop except for various drives disappeared, clicking on various things did nothing but a restart has things back to normal. This would have been more perturbing if it had not been for this recent exchange about this.
So peek-a-boo desktop seems to be a feature. Not sure why it's happening to this system. It's an IMP, lots of memory, lots of storage. It's not the first time it's happened. I'm glad it's not happening very often, but having it happen in a folder view was special. *shrug*
I'm having an alternate problem. Stuff is just randomly re-appearing on the desktop after I move it elsewhere. I save a file to the desktop. Edit it in some manner. Drag it to its eventual home. The file moves and then 10-15 seconds later the file re-appears on the desktop. I did a reboot earlier and it stopped for a couple of hours, but it's back now.
Anybody else see this? I updated to 13.3 last week and saw no issues like this after the update. Everything just started this morning after a reboot, which was done to try and get my screensaver working again (which did die post 13.3 update).
Anybody else see this? I updated to 13.3 last week and saw no issues like this after the update. Everything just started this morning after a reboot, which was done to try and get my screensaver working again (which did die post 13.3 update).
I think I've seen that with a folder I have set to iCloud. It seems to stutter if there are some unknown (to me) network issues. I thought they were related to the great disappearing desktop, but it's not set for iCloud. I am so grateful that it's not destructive, yet. But iCloud tripping out like that seems to make me think I'd not want to use it?
I have issues with Mail, where messages I've deleted seem to hang in the folder for extended amounts of time. And if I try to delete them, the only option is undelete, and if I refresh the folder, they sometines disappear, but often don't go away until I shutdown Mail and restart it. *shrug* Maybe it IS iCloud doing this for everyone. (Nice feature)
I don't use iCloud but after my last experience I noticed a prompt to start using iCloud so that obviously raises my suspicions there. I have had that prompt before so that may have been when it happened before.
Just as an update, 13.3.1 seems to have fixed whatever bug was doing that.
Been using iCloud since launch. Never had any issue with data loss. This was the first time a bug had popped up that even remotely involved it, but I think it had more to do with how the OS was moving files and how it was registering that with iCloud for the file sync than anything else. Either way, I'm glad it's resolved.
It's not specifically 'data loss', as much as a loss of the alias that shows on the Finder screen. The aliases do come back, but when they disappear, they disappear in ALL open folders too. It's like it just says 'where did they go? Oh well, can't find them, but here are your connected drives'. It's odd that file and folder aliases disappear, but drive aliases don't. Not that I'm complaining, but it's just kind of angst inducing to see *all of your files disappear*.
Oh, and, for me, it doesn't happen very often, so it's far too early, IMO, to say it's fixed. I'm just so glad that (so far) there is no actual data loss.
AND...
It happened today: Working on the second screen, and caught it out of the corner of my eye: *POOF* only drives. Weird, and not fixed.
Not sure what was running, and I'd imagine that if Activity Monitor was running it wouldn't happen. (Quantum mechanics and all)
It happened today: Working on the second screen, and caught it out of the corner of my eye: *POOF* only drives. Weird, and not fixed.
Not sure what was running, and I'd imagine that if Activity Monitor was running it wouldn't happen. (Quantum mechanics and all
)Truly weird - I guess I am lucky that I have had it happen only twice. I typically have only very standard Apple apps running.AND...
It happened today: Working on the second screen, and caught it out of the corner of my eye: *POOF* only drives. Weird, and not fixed.
Not sure what was running, and I'd imagine that if Activity Monitor was running it wouldn't happen. (Quantum mechanics and all
This has been happening on my iMac for about a year now. I will leave to grab a coffee and when I come back, the documents or pictures folder I left open on my desktop is totally empty, but I only have to click on the left sidebar and boom, they bounce back. Or I will come to the Mac and nothing is on my desktop except drives, open finder and they are back. I have iCloud disabled because I thought that was the most logical explanation, but it is still happening often. Really weird, and worrying. I'd love an explanation and a fix.
Have a look at the section āQuickly show desktop itemsā in this article.
āIn older versions of macOS, hiding your open windows and showing the files on your desktop either required a trackpad gesture or pressing the Cmd+F3 keyboard shortcut. If you didnāt have a trackpad or couldnāt remember the shortcut, it could be fiddly.
Now, you can do it by simply clicking an empty space on your desktop. This is enabled by default, but you might not want that ā one slip on your mouse buttons could unexpectedly send all your windows flying out of the way.
To disable this feature, just open the Settings app and select Desktop & Dock in the left-hand sidebar. Under the Desktop & Stage Manager header, select Only in Stage Manager from the dropdown menu next to Click wallpaper to reveal desktop. Thatās all there is to it.ā
āIn older versions of macOS, hiding your open windows and showing the files on your desktop either required a trackpad gesture or pressing the Cmd+F3 keyboard shortcut. If you didnāt have a trackpad or couldnāt remember the shortcut, it could be fiddly.
Now, you can do it by simply clicking an empty space on your desktop. This is enabled by default, but you might not want that ā one slip on your mouse buttons could unexpectedly send all your windows flying out of the way.
To disable this feature, just open the Settings app and select Desktop & Dock in the left-hand sidebar. Under the Desktop & Stage Manager header, select Only in Stage Manager from the dropdown menu next to Click wallpaper to reveal desktop. Thatās all there is to it.ā
Thank you Mike. I'll try your advice. I do have a trackpad and I am running Sonoma on a 27" 2019 iMac.
The problem is that Apple has introduced a new way to do something (hide windows) that previously required a very specific section, and this new way is very easy to do unintentionally and is the default.
The key sentence is the last paragraph, just change the setting in Desktop and Dock as described.