What are these brown box icons in left bottom corner of my files??

Anonymous
2022-03-07T21:29:56+00:00

Does anyone know where these small brown box icons came from and what they mean?? I suddenly have these little brown icons (looks like a small file box) on most of my files, Word, pdf, photos, etc. I've googled the daylights out of this and apparently lots of folks have the same question but no one has an answer. I hasn't affected my ability to open files but it's really annoying! (see pic below) Does it have something to do with my upgrade to Windows 11?

Thanks!

Windows for home | Windows 11 | Performance and system failures

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Anonymous
2022-04-23T00:35:08+00:00

Had this exact same issue today. The resolution was quick no reinstall. I'm on Win11, so perhaps that was a plus in this scenario. Here's the fix that worked for me:

  1. Open windows explorer <windows-key + e>
  2. If you're using OneDrive you should see something like "OneDrive - Personal" within the left-hand pane. If so, Right-Click to access the context-menu.
  3. You should see the menu-item: "Always keep on this device", select this.
  4. Recheck your desktop; no more brown boxes, yay!

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  2. Anonymous
    2024-11-27T14:03:38+00:00

    If you go to File explorer and hilite any files that this is happening on,

    then right click and go down to "More Options" then on that page click

    on "Make available offline" the little brown boxes will go away.

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  3. Anonymous
    2024-11-26T01:42:06+00:00

    Are you kidding me?! I asked this question in another lifetime, and you're just now getting back to me?!

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  4. Anonymous
    2024-11-25T22:52:29+00:00

    The context menu does not have "Always keep on this device" as an option.

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