How many icons do you typically keep on the desktop of your computer?

20, although most of them are for work.

Right now there are 23, which is pretty normal. I tend to cram them all into the top left and bottom right corners of the screen. The more frequently used stuff goes in the bottom right corner.

11 and 2 of them are folders containing more folders and icons

Zero. Not a fan of the whole icon thing. Yes, I have a computer and I'm running a window system, but no icons.

70-80. I'm an icon pack rat. A lot of them are for things that are old, and I don't know what some of them are for.

It sort of depends on what you mean by icons, but I guess the answer is 3 on my desktop computer, and 2 on my laptop. That's not counting the dock or the virtual desktop thing. I hate having the screen cluttered with icons.

22 right now

> 70-80. I'm an icon pack rat. A lot of them
> are for things that are old, and I don't
> know what some of them are for.

I think your desktop looks hilarious. It matches the clutter in the entry way.

I count 17 at the moment 1, with auto-arrange on, 1 column on the left, plus 1/4 column more. This is a bit more than I like, but I have more than the usual number of balls in the air right now.

There are 96 icons on my desktop. I've been doing some spring cleaning.

I never use them. I always have 3-4 programs running at once, full screen, so my desktop never shows.

What clutter in the entryway?

Oh my! I thought I was the only one.

There aren't that many on my PC at home. But since I use my laptop for a longer period of time each day, I gave me answer for this.

Currently I have:

Folders: 4
Adobe documents: 1
Applications: 9
Image files: 10
Spreadsheets: 32
Word Documents: 15
Shortcuts: 4
Text files: 7
QRP files (graphical reports): 3
UFF files (data files transmitted to/from our customers) :3
SQL scripts: 2
Zip files: 3

Just the recycle bin.

test

Is it all gone?

What clutter are you talking about? The stuff on the shelves or the stuff on the floor?
NO it's not gone. Almost, though.

Right now 33.

I'd say a rotating 10-15' as I use the Quicklaunch & the menu. I reserve the desktop for notes and such for school

I hate a messy desktop.

Don't own my own computer. If I did, I'd guess only a few. I like having stuff in the bar at the bottom better.

a bunch. about 40

At work around 60; at home around 3.

There are 22 on my work computer.

Which ones? Mine, my son's, our shared icons?

Typically, under 20. I currently have about twice that though so I can get quick access to my project work.

not sure
This is actually my sister's computer, so some of the icons are mine and some are hers, and some we share

Right now, there are 8. A few weeks ago, I removed about 10 or so that I never used....junk that came on the computer that I had no interest in.

I try to keep only stuff I'm actively using on my desktop. I dislike desktop clutter and find it very distracting; I try to keep my screen clean, dark background to reduce eye strain.

21, amongst the norms like My documents, recycle bin, my computer are:

Partypoker, Pokerstars, yahoo mail, Pestpatrol, spybot, my online bank, pokertracker, survey central, 2+2 poker forum, ADSL dialer...and some others etc

on my work computer about 80-90, at home about 20-30

that is so funny! I wondered if anyone was as bad as I was about this! I just got through cleaning too! I'm sure I had over 100....lol

all of the icons!

I have 19 right now. I like having an icon for everything.

You're a nihilist.

35 on the desktop.
26 in the task tray.
12 in the quick launch.

Some of these are shortcuts to folders or documents.
I seldom use the ones on the desktop.

I have roughly 2300 personal folders, mostly containing research.

My Start Menu has been optimized for NumKey navigation, for instance:
Win 1 2 = Docs | contacts
Win 2 1 0 = Apps | Office | Calculator
Win 2 1 1 2 = Apps | Office | Text | Wordpad
The trick to do this is to name all folders, apps, and docs in your start menu with something like:
2) WordPad.

What can I say? I'm a hoarder. I've actually just done another clear out and got it down to 68 (mostly by deleting documents that relate to tickets I resolved in 2003 )

I've got 8 right now

I had to look up just what that word means. I tend to think that my approach is more traditional than these newfangled icons.

Okay. I wasn't certain as there are icons that only my son uses and ones that only I use.

ZERO

You got rid of My Computer and the Recycling Bin?

AIM, Firefox, Thunderbird, and Jasc PSP in the top left corner. Recycle Bin in the bottom right.
I like it organized.

I currently have 16.

And about that amount at work too.

33... but I use about three of them regularly.

I usually only have 1 or 2 on my desktop, but in my Mac OS I have the "dock" which pops up from the bottom of my screen when I run my cursor down there. It contains 19 icons.

2

50-60 I have a lot of game on it. Also tons of stories in my documents.

I have way to many icons on my computer to count like hundreds and hundreds.

Other: Zero I use the Microsoft Office shortcut bar on auto-hide. I don't like desktop icons.

I'm too lazy to count.

17 at the moment.

14 at this time of survey

15-20

Many probably 10-20

Not to intrude on your desktop, however I have heard from the professionals that too many items on your desk top will slow down your computer.... Just some extra info in case you care. -)

I'm sure it does, I'm just too lazy to get rid of it.

Items on the desktop are just shortcuts and take up no more processing than shortcuts in folders (unless they're animated). Items in your task tray (on the lower right) are different though because those things are usually running software. The ones on the left are just shortcuts again, and don't run until you click them.

See comment to srflorida.

Cool. A reason not to get rid of them!

If you want to reduce clutter, you can create a folder and create a desktop shortcut for it, then drag all your unused desktop icons into the folder.

I drag them down to my left tasktray which has been stretched to have four rows. My task tray is set on auto-hide, so all I have to do is bring my mouse to the bottom of the screen and icons for all my apps appear.

ok thanks

Cool, just did it myself. It was only last night I figured out I could use my IE browser directly from outlook, though i still prefer the multi-tab bookmarking of Netscape. One click and everything I visit daily is opened, likewise I group research subjects like that.

26, but I had to go count!

I try to keep things as minimalistic and tidy as possible, that way I don't end up with a bunch of useless crap on my desktop. Also, it's good for the mind to know program pathways, even if it is mindlessly/thoughtlessly redundant after time, because it's useful when using foreign machines (as in, NOT your own).

I don't know right offhand and I'm too lazy to minimize this page and count.

1. Just my recycle bin, and that's only because I can't get rid of it. Icons on the desktop piss me off.