The Best Way to Organize Your Computer Files 

I have a very organized computer btw thanks for this video :)

Purely hierarchical organisation does not work

4:45 CAN YOU PLEASE TELL ME HOW TO CREATE SUCH TREE LIKE STUCTURE

i also recommend splitting root folders into personal and general folders. (personal being files you create and general being files you acquire trough public means) for example a picture of your cat is not the same as a picture of A cat. one is personal one is general in nature. in personal you can subdivide by your life categories as you called them and the general one you can subdivide into medium format. this makes it possible to organize YOUR files vs public files but also makes it easier to backup your files which you Cant find on the internet vs files that you CAN find on the internet. for example you wouldn't want to backup funny memes the same you would want the photos of your kids or something like that. ) and if eventually you want to share these general files lets say between computers of the house or maybe a partner you can easily maintain privacy by just not sharing the personal tree and only sharing the general tree (files which can already be found publicly on the internet anyway) you can even create a 3rd root folder that is personal but shared ... (called shared or shares)

I am very surprised that I recognize so many of my old favorite Post-Hardcore bands that I saw live back in the early 2000's on your music folder list. Major props. I wish I could have seen the full list because there were a few I had forgotten of and I only saw the start of your list. Glad to know you have a great taste in music. 🎸🙌🤘 These are just the ones I've seen: A Day To Remember, A Static Lullaby, As I lay Dying, AFI, Alexisonfire, All That Remains, Angels & Airwaves, Armor For Sleep, Atreyu, August Burns Red, A7X, Brand New, Bloc Party, Bullet For My Valentine, Circa Survive, Chiodos, Coheed, MCR...

Tip: Tags solve this problem 😉

4:45 CAN ANYONE TELL ME HOW TO CREATE SUCH TREE LIKE STUCTURE

@@kosuvorov-x How does that work?

@@sharmavinit9536 UP!

Literally me!!

Same

They're already on a folder called desktop though...

@@Vgang101 Inside that folder create a folder called desktop, and inside that one create another, and inside that one another, until you have an inception 20092019 layers deep.

😂😂😂

😂 😂 😂

That's exactly what I struggle with and why I arrived on this video. If I make a presentation for a specific project, should it go in that project folder or in a presentations folder... I am not sure what you mean by "organize them per tag". Do you have a specific recommendation on how to do that?

Try having the file in one place and use a shortcut for the other places you need it in.

@@ammarramic Very Good Idea!

Yes, like when you have several subfolders with the same name like "Material". What I started to do is adding the name of the main folder to Material like "Work Material" If it's an specific project I would add numbers to the main folder and repeat each subfolder, like 01 Project Name, 01 Material, 01 Books. I also would like to know other ideas.

@@maxdustycake Organizing by file type makes little sense when your file system gets even slightly complex, thats why it should be on the bottom of the organization hierarchy. For example: work > project > all files associated with that project sorted by type (images, presentations, text files).

That's so clever!

@@lauramalagodi4633 So, basically, I've set up an extra folder in my directory called "Moving Bin", which itself has folders labeled the likes of "A - Move to Work Files" (I add the A prefix so it's always at the top of the page if I sort alphabetically). And within those folders, I basically simulate my file structure, until at the very end of each tree, I link to shortcuts that lead to the actual folders where I would want to store them. Then finally, I create a shortcut to my moving bin folder(s) in the folders I'd like to sort through. Whenever you click-and-drag a file over a folder icon or a shortcut-to-a-folder icon, it will know to put the file in the folder that your shortcut refers to. This way, you don't have to drag your actual moving bin folder into any folder literally and wait for the computer to move the 100GB+ files or whatever. You can just copy the shortcut to the file and drag into that instead. I know that that sounds like common sense, but I don't think many people actually think to create a folder that's purely to move things around with. I find this a very efficient way of working, since I can just turn my brain to 50% attention and click-and-drag my files in a way that I think makes sense into this mock version of my folder structure. If I ever come to the conclusion that I've made a mistake, I just feed the things I've misfiled back up through the top (the moving bin) and then keep going without worrying too much about a couple of unfiled, 'difficult' files that are waiting for me to adjudicate on. This also is a good way of getting an intuition of what isn't working about your file directory; you shouldn't even have to think about how you're filing your files, it should be relatively automatic, so whenever you have to think more than 20 seconds about where a file goes, you should probably be making a new folder for this specific type of file. Let's say that I have a picture that I'd like to file and I go through my file structure. I go Moving Bin>A - Move to My Pictures>Creative>D&D>Characters>Lajila. Oh wait, I actually meant to but this into ongoing projects. I drag the file back into Moving Bin (shortcut); Moving Bin>A - Move to My Pictures>Creative>Ongoing Projects>Lajila>Lajila_Corbid.psd Actually, I think I need to be more specific, because this includes another character as well. Then I would create a new folder. On and on it goes until I've sorted through all my files. I don't stop until everything is sorted.

@@dvklaveren you should make a video to demonstrate this!

please make a demonstration of this

@@dvklaveren I agree, might make more sense if you illustrated this technique.

nice, dude. I'm doing that right now actually. Handbrake is amazing.

Hey Maru, this is exactly what I wanted to affirm that I'm not so crazy when it gets to organizing. My files/folders aren't a total mess but require some work in order for me to get satisfactory relief. Procrastinated for a while now, but I need to have this done in the shortest time possible. I believe yours wasn't organized from word go. 3yrs is way too long.

To reiterate, I was in this video bout 6 months back, but trying to get my flow correct from every source, considering that my revived passion for film/photography and music requires tons of work and probably ease in switching from PC to Mac [editing value] in the near future. Let's stay organized folks, aids productivity.

@@ianvitalis It can take less than 3 years for sure but the amount of stuff i was hoarding was massive (Keep in mind it's stuff i have been hoarding for more than 15 years that's been all over the place, it's easier to accumulate stuff than it is to organize it) I didn't work at it every single day just most days when i had the chance and when i did it was several hours non-stop. If it's just videos and photos it definitively can be done in a couple of months. Just be careful with "compulsive decluttering" that's a thing and it sucks when you regret getting rid of something, one of the reasons it took so long for me is that i carefully considered each file and the files tree didn't really take shape at first- Procrastinated to even start for a long while but the benefits of finally doing it is worth it in many ways

😐

How did you decided to organise your files? what order did you give it?

first time in years? jesus what the hell are you doing to your pc

@@konondayo5397 honestly IDK how to use a laptop so I just dowbload every school work, and picture to a place called download. I have 0 folder.

😀😀😀😀

There...there are people who live like in all sorts of ways.

good question, but great video though!

My friend have all his word files in an map called documents, he spends like 20 minutes just to find the right file 🤦‍♂️

If there are, it's a world I don't want to live in.

Yeah. Everyone who uses Mac and doesn't need to spend time on this bullshit, since Spotlight + Alfred will find the right files and folders instantly, no matter where they are. This video really reminded me again how backwater Windows is.

I do that too, like all the time lol

D*mn.. i do

😂😂😂😂

Lmaoo doing this right now

Lmaoo fr

We're gonna make it! But I'm confused indeed. Even my browsers favorites are messy.

"trash files" = pirated porn videos

@@meuscompromissos4860 mine too😂😭

Meus Compromissos It’s so relieving to know I’m not the only one whose life is breaking down from being too messy

Since I got this computer, which was about 5 years ago, I installed everything in the Program Files (x86). I regret not sorting my files so much...

Sheesh 😂😂😂😂 I just winced imagining that 😂😂😂😂😂

How did you get the Ransomware?

For my Desktop I use Fences but there are similar tools out there to have your icons organized in several of these fences and have them either blend in with your background with just the title you gave visible. Also the option to just hover over the one you want for it to open etc. Now I just have 8 of them for things like Software, Video/Photo Software, Shortcuts Websites, Games, Movies and Series etc.

Following! I have the same question

Looks like Coggle!

coggle

Did you do it? 😁

@@intentionalliving7326 Yes! First I went through and figured out what I can actually delete. That sure opened up a lot of memory! My desktop is clear.

I always have some files, data or info thats lost that way. Even the temp/ 2 delete folders should be backup ;)

Wondering the same thing. Did you ever find out?

Mind mapping apps

Awesome. I was wondering the same thing. thank you Elias Kouakou

emmsnems has commented down there that it looks like it is coggle

Coogle or MindNode 😉

Check out Matt D'Avella video on that

I don't upload my documents on g drive or any other cause i dont trust them but i keep it in a pendrive or harddrive, incase of natural disasters etc easy to pick up and run.

For me, i basically make folders/tags in my notes app using same scheme/name of folders on my desk.

That’s exactly right. And I have workaround for that but I’m not gonna share it 😂

@@RaoBlackWellizedArman lol y ur not in competition with the world aha

Jarod Hardcastle lol that’s true. But I’ve found it that often people either don’t understand my approaches or do not take my words seriously and don’t even bother trying which kinda irritates me. 😏

Metadata

@@RaoBlackWellizedArman Try me

that's very useful piece of advice ! i'm amazed you don'( have more comments !!

Peter Pepper Thanks, Peter. Me too, maybe I should repost with an avatar of a busty young lady...lol My system also works really well when working in a mixed language environment as numbers are always easier to follow than words or text. No need to translate, spelling mistakes become less critical, etc.

That's really a good piece of advice! I'll use this method. Thanks!

Thomas Frank wants to know your location

@ickibot ctrl + a; Del; Enter; rclick on trash bin; clear; enter

I don't think so. Tags are good. But still without a file tree it will be a mess.

you can rename the file starting with the tag exemple: file1 and you want to give a tag ( school) do: rename it to: school_file1 or school file1 or school-file1 then if you wanna search for a tag: just enter the tag name in the search bar and all the files with this tag will appear

@@slimanemesbah8500 Not quite. Tags ≠ folders. You might not necessarily remember that the thing you are looking for is in the ‘school’ category. That’s why usually a note/file has many tags. You will end up with ridiculously long cumbersome file names if you try to cram in all the tags there. In Evernote you get suggestions from your previously entered tags list so you are unlikely to add an unsearchable misspelled tag (schol, shcool, scool, skhcool etc.) to your note.

@@skripnigor all right, then, try out Tag Explorer, you can get it for free on the microsoft store

@@RanmaruRei A file tree is, in effect, a list of tags separated by backslashes (look at the full path). But a file tree forces the list of tags to be in a specific order for no logical reason. If there was a fully robust tagging system (any file type can have tagging metadata), then the "file tree" could be completely flat, and the "structure" would be inherent in the collection of tags (in no specified order) and the boolean (and/or/not) scripts used to search.

Be interesting if you could share the DATES of your biology notes before Noah's flood. How'd you keep them dry? That, and Dates.

Yeah I don’t trust the cloud for sensitive information either

nothing is 100 % safe ... if however you are really worried about storing your data on 'the cloud', somewhere in other people's computers ... then you can instead buy a NAS, e.g. synology DS 720+ or DS 920+, and have your own privately managed cloud ...

No Data is safe

Turn on two factor authentication and you'll be fine

Folders and files can be password protected.

He’s reading our minds and uploads accordingly

Coggle

coogle.it

Shuvojit Karmakar it’s called mind map program or app

It is a web app called coggle

@@mauriciovega957 cool thanks!

@@mauriciovega957 Thank you! This is the kind of mindmap tool I've been looking for so long. Simple but just what I want.

Coggle

It's a mindmapping app called Coggle.

I guess they're messy

Who is laughing now?! 😂🤗

I mean they are not the non plus ultra. I think there are a lot of ways to organize your files that work.

@@kartoffelbrei8090 So long as you organise them at least. 🤓