Solved Lost Documents folder location tab

whs · Dec 3, 2009

I moved my documents folder to another partition. In the process I think I made a mistake - although it did move the folder. As a consequence, I lost my Location tab. In the right pane of the Start menu it shows as the partition to where I moved it - and that has a location tab (I guess I forgot to define a folder first). But when I want to move it from there with restore default, I get this message.

Documents also now shows in a yellow folder rather than green. The other folders (music, pictures, videos) did not suffer from the move because I did it the right way.
Now I want to move those folders back to C: again. It worked for all the others but I am stuck with Documents. Anybody have an idea how to fix that?

Brink · Dec 3, 2009

Hello Wolfgang,

This may be able to help, but first backup the contents of the Documents folders to another location so not to lose anything.

Use the default Documents download in Option Three in this tutorial to restore the default location of the C:\Users\(user-name)\Documents folder.
Delete all Document folders.
Restart the computer. (may need to do this a couple of times though)
If you have a yellow Documents folder (with Location tab) still, then this tutorial can fix it.

Hope this helps,
Shawn

whs · Dec 3, 2009

Thanks Shawn. I will try this. Why do I always paint myself into a corner?

Brink · Dec 3, 2009

LOL, you and me both.

whs · Dec 3, 2009

Success!! I edited the registry and that did it. Thanks again. I will retain this tutorial - just in case.

whs · Dec 3, 2009

Hi Shawn,

I think I am not out of the woodwork yet. My Documents folder functions again and Properties say it is on C:\Users\WHS, but when I open that partition, there is no Documents folder. But there is this .dat file from today on the bottom. The time stamp coincides with my actions. Unfortunately there seems to be no way to open it because " it is being used by another process".

And then when I look into my WHS folder, it does not show in the normal green but in kind of a faint green

And what is also strange is that when I try to move it to an empty Documents folder on another data partition, it gets moved and is useable, but when I look it that partiton, my perviously defined folder has disappeared together with what I moved - but the funny thing is, it functions from e.g. Documents in Start. A real mystery folder. Any advice what I should do next?

Brink · Dec 3, 2009

It looks like it is set to be hidden. Open a elevated command prompt and try the command below to see if that can clear things up after a restart.

attrib +r -h %USERPROFILE%\Documents /S /D

whs · Dec 3, 2009

Unfortunately that did not do the trick. I have hidden files enabled (it shows e.g. appdata). The message from cmd was this:

This looks like a tough one.

Brink · Dec 3, 2009

Try:

attrib +r -s -h %USERPROFILE%\Documents /S /D

whs · Dec 3, 2009

Ha, it's back on C:. You are the greatest. Thank you again. The folder is still a little faint green in the WHS folder. But maybe under the Florida sun it will tan - lol.

PS: Now I could finally move all those folders to my SSD. It's amazing how fast one can move a bunch of Gigabytes to an SSD.

Brink · Dec 3, 2009

That's great news.

Double check by right clicking on your C:\Users\WHS\My Documents folder, and have the Hidden box blank white under the General tab.

whs · Dec 3, 2009

Thanks, I'll try that when I am back on my Vista tomorrow.

whs · Dec 4, 2009

I just checked the hidden box. It is blank. I think the +r parameter in the attrib command did it.

Brink · Dec 4, 2009

Nar, the +r switch is to make it read only. The -h switch should have made it unhidden so that it will not be a faded folder.

whs · Dec 4, 2009

One never stops learning. I think I have to brush up on my cmd skills. Since I am not really a PC oldtimer, I have an educational gap there. As soon as there are too many parmeters, I get lost. LOL

Brink · Dec 4, 2009

LOL, don't feel bad. It's been so long since I used cmd regularly, I had to brush up on it as well.

Solved Lost Documents folder location tab

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