The Psychology of Desktop Icons

[french frank]

Why is it that my Time Machine HD icon has suddenly started appearing somewhere down in the bottom right-hand quartile of my screen on booting up, instead of next to the 'Macintosh HD' icon, carefully placed in the top left-hand corner? Each morning I replace it in its normal place and the next morning it has jumped back down again.

And sometimes when I try to place another (random) icon elsewhere it refuses to stay where I put it and leaps somewhere else.

[I have turned off 'Snap to Grid' which seems to have cured the second pain but not the first]

[Zucchini]

Why is it that my Time Machine HD icon has suddenly started appearing somewhere down in the bottom right-hand quartile of my screen on booting up, instead of next to the 'Macintosh HD' icon, carefully placed in the top left-hand corner? Each morning I replace it in its normal place and the next morning it has jumped back down again.

Probably the wind. Maybe ask an Everest technician to double glaze the screen

[french frank]

Probably the wind. Maybe ask an Everest technician to double glaze the screen

(I favour Staybrite which I've found most satisfactory throughout the rest of the house (not the front door as I prefer a wooden one).

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

[MrGongGong]

Is your Time Machine drive always connected to the computer?
and
Do you turn your computer OFF (I mean shut down OFF) before this happens?

[french frank]

Is your Time Machine drive always connected to the computer?
and
Do you turn your computer OFF (I mean shut down OFF) before this happens?

It's always connected and I shut down completely each night.

Sometimes there have been phases when the HD hasn't mounted on boot-up, and I have to switch it off and on again.

[MrGongGong]

It's always connected and I shut down completely each night.

Sometimes there have been phases when the HD hasn't mounted on boot-up, and I have to switch it off and on again.

I think that's why it does that
Each time you restart it will re-mount and go to default location for a new HD
you probably can change this somewhere but it might be a launch TERMINAL method (which is usually much less daunting than one might imagine)

[french frank]

Not totally convinced as it's only just started happening - presumably with the last update.


(Easy enough to launch Terminal via the Launchpad - I just never know what to do then)

I expect I'll just go on carefully replacing TiMa where I want it to be until there's an update which does it automatically again.

[french frank]

aka - if that's happening all night long, no wonder it doesn't function very well next morning

[Flosshilde]

Perhaps one just has to accept that computer knows better & give in.

[Zucchini]

Did you once play pacman on the computer?

Could be a program remnant in the registry is showing this icon how to jump about before teaching it to gobble all the other icons. After which it will give you a score of 27 trillion and the computer will melt.

[french frank]

I don't know what pacman is - but I've packed the bottom left-hand corner with icons: let's see if it perches itself on top of the ones right down in the corner ... There would have to be a psychological classification for a mentality like that.

[french frank]

I don't know what pacman is - but I've packed the bottom left-hand corner with icons: let's see if it perches itself on top of the ones right down in the corner ... There would have to be a psychological classification for a mentality like that.

Well, the result of that was, to say the least, unpredictable. There appears to have been a complete mental breakdown somewhere ...

[Flosshilde]

In the computer?

[french frank]

In the computer?

Nope, in the Time Machine HD - I had forgotten all about the little ploy when I switched on, but noted at once that the icon appeared - as it used to - top right, alongside the Mac HD. Then I remembered - and there was the little cluster of defensive icons, bottom left. The TM was still its temporary orange colour (before settling down as its permanent green) when - it disappeared completely. I searched the screen to see where it had gone - nowhere, and the stern admonishment appeared : "Disc was not ejected properly ..." I thought it hadn't mounted completely, so switched it off and back on again but noted the power light was no longer working. External HD dead as a dodo. Fortunately, I've never regarded Time Machine as more than useful on very rare occasions when I deleleted something by accident and just had to go back to the previous back-up to retrieve it.

I suppose it could be an electrical fault but ... (I did do a hasty back-up of the HD, just in case doooom was lurking round the corner )