Jennifer writes: I am a Mac Lion user, and I am having some troubles with my desktop.

I always keep my desktop’s “Sort by” as “none” so that I can arrange the items by myself. Also, when I would drag a picture or any other item into my desktop, it would just stay where I dragged it to.

Few days ago, I realized that my desktop wasn’t doing this anymore. Whenever I would drag anything to my desktop, it will automatically arrange itself in the right. I find this very uncomfortable because I just like the items to stay where I dragged them.

Is there any way for me to fix this? Thank you so much!

Hi Jennifer! Yep, the “Sort by” options for the Mac’s desktop can be a bit confusing—and even finding them can be a pain.

Mac show view options

You can get to your Mac’s “Show View Options” settings by right-clicking the desktop.

You’d think you could tweak your desktop “Sort by” settings from the Mac’s main System Preferences window, but no.

Instead, you’ll need to right-click on the desktop and select “Show View Options” from the pop-up window.

A window labeled “Desktop” will appear, complete with a series of settings; go ahead and click the “Sort by” pull-down menu and select either “None” or “Snap to Grid.”

If “None” is selected yet your desktop items are still frantically sorting themselves on the right side of the screen, choose another settings (like “Name”) and then go back to “None.” That should do the trick.

Hope that helps, Jennifer. Still have questions? Just post ’em below, or send me an email.

Click here for more Mac tips!