43 Folders

Back to Work

Merlin’s weekly podcast with Dan Benjamin. We talk about creativity, independence, and making things you love.

Join us via RSS, iTunes, or at 5by5.tv.

”What’s 43 Folders?”
43Folders.com is Merlin Mann’s website about finding the time and attention to do your best creative work.

What is the best way to organize folders on my computer?

mobius | Oct 26 2006

I think this counts as a "productivity" question, because I find myself getting bogged down rummaging through my files trying to find what I need.

In the past I have set a directory structure under My Documents like so:

My Documents
    ~Docs
    ~Downloads
    ~ftp
    ~Images
    ~Media
        ~Audio
        ~Video
    ~Misc
    ~Software
    ~Work

This has changed over the years and I've added to it and have so much stuff in certain places that I can't combine similar items. I don't know what I am really trying to ask. What do you think is the proper, most efficient, way to organize your personal files on a computer? Keep in mind that I don't care about where things are installed. This is strictly about data. So in the example above, my software folder keeps backup disc images of software, games, etc. It also contains downloaded software such as drivers, install files, etc. The audio and video keep mp3s, movies, tv shows and various clips.

If you know of a better way, I'm all ears. How do you organize your files?

Thanks.

‹ Toilet Time! Other sites like 43 Folders? ›
10 Comments
POSTED IN:
  • 36773 reads
TOPICS: Productivity & Time Management
enine's picture

There isn't really one best...

Submitted by enine on November 13, 2006 - 9:26am.

There isn't really one best way or right or wrong way to do it.
I've recently reorganized my whole file system partially to get away from a date based system and to make it more shareable between multiple OS's.
Since your listing the windows default folders I'll list mine from the windows side.
I never cared for Micorosft's way too long of names for "documents and setings\blah\my documents\my pictures" and stuff like that. I partioned my drive and keep all my data on one partition to start with then pointed my user profile there. I then dropped the my from the front of everything making it easier to use command line stuff without haveing to always put " around ethe names due to the space". Then I renamed and moved a lot of the Microsoft default because IMHO pictures, music, video, etc are not documents and therefore do not belong under the "my documents" structure and you typically use something else to manage them as others have mentioned things like picassa, itunes, etc.
So now that I have the profile moved everything looks the same under Linxu or Windows and its on a seperate drive that I copy to a removable drive for backups. If that drive would get messed up in anyway its an easy task to switch over to the backup drive since its all structured the same.
So I have:
G:\enine\Documents
G:\enine\Pictures
G:\enine\Music
ad well as a few other profile related folders
\enine gets mounted under home under linux so its \home\enine\documents etc there.

Under Documents are now actually just documents and divided logically.
\Documents\Archive
\Documents\Projects
\Documents\Reference

Then you furthur divide projects down into whatever project I'm working on so
\Projects\project1
\Projects\project2
\Projects\project2

I've worked as a consultant before so sometimes this has another level like
\documents\customer1\project1 so its a fairly flexible system, since I'm not employed full time for one company I just drop out the client level.

Then when a project is finished the while folder gets moved to \archive
so I have then
\Documents\Archive\Client1\projetc1
\Documents\Archive\Client1\projetc2
\Documents\Archive\Client2\projetc1
\Documents\Archive\Client2\projetc2
etc

then there is a personal folder whith things like my resume, certifications, etc

\reference are documents that I have downloaded that others have created so I can refer to them as needed. Its divided down as necessary.

So putting it all together:

enine\Documents\Archive\Client1\projetc1
enine\Documents\Archive\Client1\projetc2
enine\Documents\Archive\Client2\projetc1
enine\Documents\Archive\Client2\projetc2
enine\Documents\Projetcs\Project1
enine\Documents\Projetcs\Project2
enine\Documents\Reference\...
enine\Documents\Personal
enine\Pictures
enine\Music

The \enine\Documents\Projects is sort of my inbox then I create a project folder for a new project or file under an existing project.

» POSTED IN:
 
EXPLORE 43Folders THE GOOD STUFF

Popular
Today

Popular
Classics

Oldies but goldies

An Oblique Strategy:
Honor thy error as a hidden intention

STAY IN THE LOOP:

Subscribe with Google Reader

Subscribe on Netvibes

Add to Technorati Favorites

Subscribe on Pageflakes

Add RSS feed

The Podcast Feed

Cranking

Merlin used to crank. He’s not cranking any more.

This is an essay about family, priorities, and Shakey’s Pizza, and it’s probably the best thing he’s written. »

Scared Shitless

Merlin’s scared. You’re scared. Everybody is scared.

This is the video of Merlin’s keynote at Webstock 2011. The one where he cried. You should watch it. »