Stop putting crap in my Documents folder!!

T

thendis

Registered
Am I the only one getting really frustrated with applications adding folders to the Documents folder?

I just finished doing a fresh install of OS X and opened my Docs folder to add my folders only to find - to my horror - four extra folders: "AdobeStockPhotos" and "Updater" from AdobeCS, "Microsoft User Data" from MS Office, and "Roxio Converted Items" from Toast!!!

I'm a very anal person and I like my folders ogranised *perfectly*, so this sort of thing really irritates me.

Am I the only one?
 
I just made another Documents folder for me and left the main one for the software.
Don't sweat the little stuff :)
 
I have a mini, so I bought an external drive and partitioned it, one partition is just for docs, and I do what Ashka does basically, and leave the other docs folder to do what it wants.
 
I do find it annoying, it's a very Windows thing to do (my My Documents folder is full of Adobe and Microsoft crap). There's a reason there's ~/Library/Application Support/ it's for all those folders that you never have a reason to look at that don't need to be in your Documents folder (or even in your root Home folder for that matter).
 
Well I have to say that I've been using OS X so long that I've become quite acostomed to this behavior...

...but the more I think about it the more I totally agree with thendis. If it truely is the users documents, then nothing else should ever be put there.

Currently this folder has a ton of stuff I did not put there and also beleive belong in ~/Library/Application Support:

  • Acrobat User Data
  • AppleWorks User Data
  • iChats
  • Maxprog
  • MCPref
  • Microsoft User Data
  • Microsoft User Data.old
  • Mozilla
  • NewRootApplet.java
  • Office Projects
  • Palm
  • Retrospect_backup_schedules
  • Virtual PC
  • Virtual PC List
  • Virtual PC Scripts
 
This has bugged me ever since OS 8. But I've just kept my old habit I got from System 7: I use my own "Documents" folder that lives on my desktop. I never use the default Documents folder at all.

My entire organization structure is desktop-based, not Home-based. Coming from System 7, it just makes more sense to me that way, although OS X clearly doesn't want to be treated that way (click on the Finder in the Dock, and what happens? The freakin' Home folder pops up!).

It's especially annoying since there's no real rhyme or reason to what goes there as opposed to the Preferences or Application Support folders.

So yes, I too have been forced to surrender that folder to the barbarian apps.
 
Mikuro said:
...although OS X clearly doesn't want to be treated that way (click on the Finder in the Dock, and what happens? The freakin' Home folder pops up!)....
Click to expand...
You can change that in the Finder Preferences...
 
Hm... This thread made me notice that I don't really 'use' the Documents folder, either. From my first Mac experience on, the desktop was my friend (and clutter, of course).

But I guess if you're a) coming from Windows or b) trying to _do_ what Apple wants, i.e. actually use the Documents folder, it's just bad practice how some apps handle that. I think *"Roxio Converted Items" from Toast* is okay. That's actually user documents, isn't it.

If I ask myself why developers put stuff in the user's Documents folder, the answer is rather simple. They can choose Application Support in the Library, but that - to users - might seem sneaky. So they choose the Documents folder which _shows_ you what an app is doing.

Just an example: Garage Band puts - at installation time - more than 2 GB of data into my Library. When I'm trying to find the files that use too much space and I only look at my Desktop and Documents folder, those don't show up. (That's part of why I'm using OmniDiskSweeper to find such culprits.)

I guess there's no real solution to the problem. Putting stuff in Documents has pros and cons, using the Library has pros and cons. Were Apple to create two Documents folders (one for the user, one for the apps), we would cry 'inconsistent interface', too, probably, because there already _is_ the Application Support in Library.

The one thing a user can do now is - as suggested - to create your own folder structure outside the dreaded Documents folder.
 
One other place apps seem to dump stuff is in the Shared Folder in Users. This mildly annoys me, i have some Macromedia stuff in there amongst other things.

So, would it not be reasonable to put things that are needed system wide directly into the App Support folder, and local user items in the users Library App Support folder.

Seems logical.
 
I downloaded File Buddy 8 and made all of these crap folders invisible. So the programs still use them, but I can't see them. My folder is nice and neat now :)
 
No, you are not the only one. This really grinds my gears too. Adobe are the very worst for it, they scatter shit all over the hard drive. Utterly incompetent and/or lazy.
 
Bayley said:
No, you are not the only one. This really grinds my gears too. Adobe are the very worst for it, they scatter shit all over the hard drive. Utterly incompetent and/or lazy.
Click to expand...

I get the feeling that Adobe is just porting over most of their code from their Windows code from some kind of code converter! Just look at the code from Adobe Photoshop Elements compared to some Mac alternative like Pixelmator. The size difference alone can point to the fact that programs like Pixelmator that use X-Code and internal OS X systems to do remarkable simlar things that PSE can‘t do.
 
Last edited:
10 year old thread - tsk! tsk!

Notice how much has (not!) changed over the years?
This thread was started in 2005. Post #12 from 2005, then #13 from 2015.
And, (not sure why it would be interesting or surprising in any way), Adobe is still accused of poor code.
 
Adobe is still accused of poor code.
Click to expand...

Piss poor. I think they have all the decent engineers pumping out new features for marketing, and then literally just monkeys on typewriters doing the installer stuff.
 
Nah, I was really just wondering why that's special enough to wake up a 10-year old thread. :D
There's lots of opinions about "compact" or just efficient code. Adobe still appears to not be too concerned about that, yet seems to maintain their position in the marketplace. That's likely their most important idea....
 
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