How to Stop File Explorer Sorting by Week and Month

Anonymous
2019-07-26T21:53:02+00:00

After the recent update Windows file explorer is now grouping items by day, week and month. I do not want this. I want the old way back please. How do I get rid of this new sorting? I hope this is not going to be like what happened to media folders where they now display metadata columns instead of name, date, size, type and even if you change them the next time you open the folder it has reverted back to metadata columns.

Update: I worked out that Group By must be set to none. How do I make this default so it doesn't revert back? I'd also like to stop my media folders reverting back to the old way too so they show name, date, size, type instead of Artist, Album, Title etc

Windows for home | Windows 10 | Files, folders, and storage

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Anonymous
2019-09-05T03:31:56+00:00

There is no bug.  Someone at Microsoft just managed to apply their default folder setting to everyone that installs the update.

To turn off file grouping feature:

  1. Open a folder that is Grouping by/sorting using week and month.
  2. Right Click in the folder
  3. Select 'Group by'
  4. Select '(None)'

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  1. Anonymous
    2021-11-14T00:02:17+00:00

    EXCELLENT!!

    I find that this issue has cropped up again 2 years later in August of 2021.

    Amazing that someone is still either screwing up or deciding that their personal settings are what everyone else should be using.

    Thank you Microsoft!!! NOT!!!!!

    So very, very, VERY true. The number of times I've gotten something set up just the way I like and then an update "improves" it causing me to spend hours of frustration till I figure out how to get it back to what I want. Not sure if its microsoft or Symantec but one of them drives me mad with tap to click. My hands aren't steady so if that's on I'm constantly "clicking" on things I don't want to (hence why I always use a mouse or a laptop with its own dedicated buttons when that's not an option due to being away for work). Yet every single update not only does tap to click get turned back on by default but it removes the option to turn it off so I have to uninstall the drivers, reinstall the old ones and turn the stupid thing off again. Old features should by default be "no change" and new features should be "off" with instructions on how to turn on if you want too.

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  2. Anonymous
    2020-02-03T08:59:25+00:00

    So you're showing us how to save the settings that are not available to fix the issue? That's pretty useless.

    This is the second answer on here that does nothing to actually answer the question of how to get rid of this unnecessary organization that windows has forced itself upon us.

    Do you get points for just throwing useless replies around? Are you out trying to earn achievements or something?

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  3. Anonymous
    2020-01-23T19:18:38+00:00

    Cheers Big Cheese

    This was driving me nuts !!!

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  4. Anonymous
    2020-01-23T12:44:41+00:00

    I also think this has confounded many because while Apply to Folders will delete saved views used by regular Explorer windows, it doesn't reset the Common Dialogs if they have already saved a view. But, if the dialogs haven't  already saved a view, they will use the modified template created by Apply to Folders.

    So, to cover all bases, it's three steps:

    1. Set Downloads view to your liking
    2. Apply to Folders
    3. Copy & paste the following into a PowerShell window:

    $Bags = 'HKCU:\Software\Classes\Local Settings\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\Bags'

    $DLID = '{885A186E-A440-4ADA-812B-DB871B942259}'

    gci $bags -recurse |  ?{$_.GetSubkeyNames() -contains $DLID} |  remove-item -Path { join-path $_.PSPath $DLID }

    Press <Enter> to execute the above code.

    Keith

    Thank you Keith! This was driving me absolutely nuts. These steps did the trick and the solution makes perfect sense (even if the initial decision by Microsoft didn't).

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