downloads folder

[KrisDan]

Brand new here,

Trying to understand the nuances of how things work. When I do a download things seem to go straight to download folder. I've figured out I can change that, but everything still downloads to the same place. What is the best way to organize these downloads. Are these actually the files/folders that were downloaded or is this an alias, pointing to where? How do I go there?

Should I be manually organizing after download? What am I missing?

Kristy

p.s. Yes I'm coming straight from a pc so maybe I just need slight tweak in the way I'm thinking/overthinking this.

 

[Jamie-Jamie]

Browsers let you pick a place where your downloads go, and then they all go there by default. They're really there!

You can always right-click a link and select "Save File to..." or something like that. That'll let you pick where it goes!

 

[Oneironaut]

Everything in the Dock is a shortcut to someplace on your hard drive. Even if you dragged your Downloads folder off the Dock, it would still exist. Just go into Finder, select your user name in the left sidebar, and you'll see your downloads folder there. To change where your downloads end up, just go to Preferences from Safari or whatever app you use to download, and there will be an option to choose where you want files to be downloaded to. Or, if you want to download a file to someplace other than your downloads folder on occasion, just right click and choose "Save File As..." or "Download File As..." like Jamie said.

 

[Bahja]

I have every download set up so they go to my desktop. It’s the easiest option. Once it’s installed you can then pick where it goes.

 

[chas_m]

I second Bahja's suggestion with one important caveat: once its downloaded, it really should not STAY on the desktop. That is generally asking for trouble.

If the thing you've downloaded is an installer, run it and it will put the app in the Applications folder. You can then trash the installer. If you've downloaded pictures, put them in the pictures folder inside your Home folder. If you've downloaded PDFs, put them in the Documents folder (and you can have sub-folders within all these folders if you want). But its a good idea to keep the desktop as clean as possible for a variety of reasons.

 

[Bahja]

I second Bahja's suggestion with one important caveat: once its downloaded, it really should not STAY on the desktop. That is generally asking for trouble.

If the thing you've downloaded is an installer, run it and it will put the app in the Applications folder. You can then trash the installer. If you've downloaded pictures, put them in the pictures folder inside your Home folder. If you've downloaded PDFs, put them in the Documents folder (and you can have sub-folders within all these folders if you want). But its a good idea to keep the desktop as clean as possible for a variety of reasons.

That is exactly what i do. My desktop is clear. I don’t even have the dock showing and i have a total of 7 items in my dock.

I bought this Macbook Pro last nov, it’s the 2nd laptop i have owned. The first one i messed up one night when i was drunk and thought i was Bill Gates. For the three years i had it it never worked properly. haha

I gave it to my step daughter after first giving it to my mate who is an expert on PC’s. He can normally fix ANYTHING to do with PC’s in a few hours. It took him two days to wipe my old laptop clean and start fresh with windows 7 ready for my step daughter. he said in 20 years it was the hardest fix he had to do. He did say that it was not all my fault as i had all sorts of trojans and bugs and viruses in it too.


So i learned my lesson. I am ultra careful what i download and if i am going to DL something i do a google search on it first and will spend a good hour (sometimes) going through all the different information on it.

I am not good with computer even though they amaze me.

 

[chas_m]

Good practices, Bahja, but as you probably know there aren't any viruses for the Mac so that's one less thing to have to spend time thinking about.

 

[Bahja]

Good practices, Bahja, but as you probably know there aren't any viruses for the Mac so that's one less thing to have to spend time thinking about.

I know mate. But there will be one day...............

I make sure i back up once a week too just incase i ever come home drunk and think i’m “Steve Jobs” this time and go into places in the Mac that idiots like me could not even pronounce haha.

 

[didymus]

He did say that it was not all my fault as i had all sorts of trojans and bugs and viruses in it too.

You had all that and he said it wasn't your fault - he was being KIND! Any stuff that gets on to your machine that you don't want is certainly your fault!

 

[EndlessMac]

If you have Firefox you can set it to ask you every time where to place the file which means there is no need to do the "save as..." command. It will automatically ask you every time you try to download something.

Not managing your downloads is a good way to fill up your hard drive fast because there are a lot of temporary files a person can download off the internet. Also all the files you want to keep will be lost in the crowd of other downloaded files if you don't manage them regularly.

 

[Bahja]

You had all that and he said it wasn't your fault - he was being KIND! Any stuff that gets on to your machine that you don't want is certainly your fault!

Ok, i’m sorry. I just phoned him to tell him that you told him he was wrong to tell me there were other factors involved

Thanks