Windows 10: How to Exclude OneDrive Syncing Desktop But Keep it Available Locally?

Hello Microsoft support community!


I do not even know if this is possible, but I would like to know if I can exclude OneDrive from syncing my desktop folder across machines but still have the local desktop to each individual machine available. It is annoying when I install programs on my desktop machine, thus the icon appears on the virtual desktop, then that program's icon is synced to my laptop's virtual desktop as well. I want the program on my desktop but not my laptop.


I saw this ( https://support.office.com/en-us/article/choose-which-onedrive-folders-to-sync-to-your-computer-98b8b011-8b94-419b-aa95-a14ff2415e85 ) post detailing how to exclude certain folders from syncing to OneDrive, but then it also says "If you uncheck a folder you are syncing to your computer, the folder will be removed from your computer. The folder and its contents will still be available online."


I want to uncheck a folder and still have it available locally, not removed from my computer as MS says in that post. Is that possible? Can I exclude my desktops from syncing between machines, but still have them available locally? If not, that is a very fundamental flaw and should be remedied.


Thanks!

:)

 

OneDrive Placeholders are coming back, now called On-Demand Sync




"At Ignite 2016, Microsoft has just announced that it is bringing Placeholders back to OneDrive on Windows 10. Now, they are not called Placeholders anymore — Microsoft is renaming the feature to “On-Demand Sync” which makes a lot more sense than “Placeholders”.

The company demoed this feature at Microsoft Ignite today, and it works just like it used to previously. As you can see in the screenshot above, the files stored in OneDrive weighed in around 9GB, but the actual size on disk was only around 3MB which is really neat. Of course, this feature isn’t anything new as it was available back in the Windows 8 days. However, Microsoft removed the feature with Windows 10, and after lots of waiting, they are finally coming back.

In case you are not familiar with OneDrive Placeholders, it’s a pretty neat feature which lets you see all of your OneDrive files on your computer — but they are not actually downloaded on your PC. When you open them, OneDrive will download the files on-demand, saving your local space which is really useful, especially if you have a PC that doesn’t have a lot of storage.

While Microsoft didn’t announce when exactly On-Demand Sync will be available to OneDrive users, we suspect it will be available with Windows 10 Redstone 2 — which is expected to arrive early next year. "

https://mspoweruser.com/onedrive-placeholders-coming-back-now-called-demand-sync/

 

Windows 10 - OneDrive

Right click on the app and one of the properties has an option to not automatically start it. Uncheck, restart the computer, and it should stop. If you want to go another step further, find the OneDrive app in the start menu, right click on it and uninstall.

If that is still insufficient, there is a batch uninstaller for OneDrive available online. I can copy the code here if you need it.

 

How does Windows 10 conversion setup offline OneDrive files by default


When I migrate to Windows 10,

• Placeholders will be deleted from my local OneDrive folder.
• Per folder selective sync will be available.

But that leaves a question…

• Will per folder selective sync be turned OFF by default at conversion?
  • This means offline files on the local OneDrive folder will be orphaned.
  • Therefore, to avoid confusion, I’d need to either (a) delete them since they’re available online and since sync is off, or (b) turn on selective sync for the folder they’re in and sync all files in the folder, or (c) do nothing if OneDrive automatically deleted them in the conversion.

• Or, will per folder selective sync be turned ON by default for folders that have offline files in them, syncing all files in such a folder?

• Or, will OneDrive try to sync all folders to my local OneDrive, overwhelming the smaller drive on my laptop?

It seems to me this would be important to know, but I've not been able to find anything on it.