Windows 10: Onedrive full, cleaned up, now most of my desktop items are gone?

I hope this is a good place to ask.
I got a notification that my OneDrive was approaching "full". I rarely use OneDrive, so I was at a loss how it filled up. I went to my OneDrive account and found a lot of files that were years old, so I deleted all of them.

Now my desktop is bare. Few shortcuts survived. Even my background image was gone.

I went back to my OneDrive account and I went to the "Recycle Bin" and selected "Restore All".

My OneDrive is now almost full again, but the desktop items are still missing.

1) Is there an easy way to restore them?
2) How do I stop OneDrive from deciding for me which files, especially my desktop, to save on OneDrive?

:)

 

OneDrive storage is full

Hi,



Thank you for writing to Microsoft Community Forums.



We understand your concern as you are having difficulties in uploading the files in OneDrive, which is upgraded to 100 GB.



In this scenario we would suggest you to follow the steps below to reset OneDrive:

1. Press the Windows key + R to open the Run Window.
2. In the Run Window enter the following: localappdata%\Microsoft\OneDrive\onedrive.exe /reset.
3. Click OK. The OneDrive system tray icon on the desktop should disappear and re-appear after a minute or two.
4. If the OneDrive system tray icon does not re-appear after a few minutes, do the following. In the Run Window Enter: %localappdata%\Microsoft\OneDrive\onedrive.exe.

If the issue persists, we do have dedicated support team for OneDrive and you can get in touch with them for further assistance. Follow the below steps to contact the OneDrive support team.



Sign in to OneDrive.com from any browser or Open OneDrive App, click the ‘?’ help icon on the top banner of the page and select
Email OneDrive support. Submit your question and follow the prompts to request support.



You may also refer our
OneDrive help center for further assistance.



Regards,



Aditya Roy

Microsoft Community – Moderator

 

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.

 

disk clean-up changed start/desktop

My inexpensive Toshiba convertible laptop just keeps running slower and slower, so Tuesday I read somewhere about Disk Clean-up (C-Net?) and tried using it. I hoped that since data was promised not to be lost, I could safely go the extra step of running
a system clean-up option in the process.

Now my entire W10 desktop has changed, including the leftside taskbar. Before the process I had Start apps alphabetically listed in a column on the left of my screen. To the right were tiles, 2-3 wide, and scrollable. The rest of the screen was clear.
My basic desktop had maybe 20 shortcut thumbnails that I used often enough to make shortcuts handier than searching the app list. And I had them placed around the screen in a format for ease of locating/remembering, and grouped by topic... such as word processors
together, photo/video links together, device manuals and links together, etc.

The clean-up wiped my desktop clear of those old shortcuts. Now there is no app list column on the left side at all when Start is pressed, and there is a second grouping of tiles on the middle and right of the screen, which only serves to jumble and confuse
the view; i.e. I can't see the tree for the forest thing. I'd just as soon have the tiles in a single scrollable 2-3-wide format like it originally was.

Additionally the left side taskbar is minus the Search field that used to be there. Now there's a left-pointing arrow that's a "back" function I don't remember before, followed by a white circle which must be clicked to open a search feature. That's an
extra unnecessary step that also wasn't there before. Sans a Taskbar Search field there is no microphone icon like before. But "Hey Cortana" still works okay.

The "book" I have ('Windows 10 for Beginners' - not the greatest learning tool ever published) doesn't seem to explain how to get everything back to what I had. I'm most perturbed by the loss of the desktop shortcut thumbnails, some of which were Folders
with links inside to our medical records and resources, etc.) Is my only option to find a complete app/program list on the computer and try one-by-one adding shortcuts again? So far my efforts right-clicking apps mostly brings menus with no "add shortcut"
option; those that do appear to consider a tile a shortcut - no thumbnail appears on the desktop. Just like right-clicking the desktop no longer provides configuration options for it. Maybe I'm confusing Desktop with Start, and should be right-clicking
the Start menu?

Oh for the XP days!