MS Office desktop icons move after I modify and save them.

Anonymous
2010-02-25T23:36:10+00:00

My MS word and excel documents that I have on the upper right hand area of my desktop move after I modify and save them.  If I open them and don't save them nothing happens, but if I modify and save them, they move to the far left aligned with other icons.  They do not appear to be temp or hidden files.  They just move to the far left arranged with other icons.  I want to modify and save them and the files to stay in the upper right hand area...  Help???

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Anonymous
2010-02-26T17:12:02+00:00

Turn off the “Auto Arrange” option for icons on the desktop, and then place icons on the desktop where you want them.

To turnoff the “Auto Arrange” feature,

For windows 7:

Right click a blank area on the desktop and select View and uncheck Auto arrange icons.

For Windows XP:

Right-click a blank area on the desktop, and then click Arrange Icons. Click the command that indicates how you want to arrange the icons (by Name, by Type, and so on), uncheck Auto Arrange.

Niranjan I K Microsoft Answers Support Engineer.

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  1. Anonymous
    2012-09-11T11:56:04+00:00

    The problem is caused by the office2003 compatibility layer of office 2007, which behaves very badly with native office2k3 files. 

    There is no fix afaik, except using the xml (docx) format.

    The broken compat api will create a new 2k3 native document on save and rename the old 2k3 document to *.tmp::hidden, only to delete it when you close word or excel.

    Because it creates yet another 2k3 native document, the next time you save, the exact same thing happens.

    And thus of course, as it's a newly created file on your desktop, it ends up in the first available slot (or the second one if you have set "show hidden files and folders").

    It would be really easy to fix if we had the office source code, but it's in microsoft hands and they're probably happy with people moving to xml faster anyway (and you should, the old format is **** in comparison).

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  2. Anonymous
    2013-06-07T23:46:01+00:00

    I had this same problem, and I fixed it based on Morg's suggestion.  If you are using Office 2007 (maybe 2010 as well, but I have 2007) and the file in question is in the .doc format, this issue will result when you save the file, because the original file is deleted and a new copy is saved on your desktop.  Here is the fix:

    1.  Open the file that is causing an issue.
    2.  In the main menu (top left, the "office button"), choose "Save As".
    3.  In the dialogue box that opens, change the "Save As Type" option (it is a drop-down list) to the most current file format (e.g. in MS Word, change "Word 97-2003 Document" to "Word Document").
    4.  Click "Save", and click "Okay" on the warning message that pops up.
    5.  Close the file; now you should have two icons for the file on your desktop: the original file in the older format, and a new file in the newer format.  Make sure you can open the new file and that nothing has changed that you can't fix.  If all is well, delete the original file and put the new one where you want it on the desktop.

    Now the problem should be solved.  To double check, open the new file and change something small, then save and close the file; it should have remained in the same place on the desktop.  Be aware that updating the file format may cause changes to your file, so be sure to scan through it and make sure nothing important has changed.  This seems to be the simplest and most permanent fix (better for me than making a shortcut and placing the file elsewhere).  Hope this helps!

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  3. Anonymous
    2010-12-22T02:37:58+00:00

    This problem resolved for me when I disabled 'align icons to grid.'  It doesn't seem that that should have any effect.  If 'align icons to grid' is switched back on the issue resumes.

    -B

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  4. Anonymous
    2011-04-11T18:05:03+00:00

    I have a work around for this irritating behaviour:

    • Create a short cut of the file on the desktop;
    • Move the file to another directory and leave the shortcut on the desktop;
    • From now on, just click the shortcut to work on the file.  The shortcut won't move.

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