I just noticed wierd desktop icons today. Some of my folder icons are
overlaid with a green circle enompasing a checkmsrk with an underscore. I
will state upfront that I am NOT runing Onedrive, nor is it installed.

What do they mean, and how can I remove them?

[Fully updated Win11 23H2 Build 22631.33296

On 3/29/24 10:35 PM, MajorLanGod wrote:
> I just noticed wierd desktop icons today. Some of my folder icons are
> overlaid with a green circle enompasing a checkmsrk with an underscore. I
> will state upfront that I am NOT runing Onedrive, nor is it installed.
>
> What do they mean, and how can I remove them?
>
> [Fully updated Win11 23H2 Build 22631.33296
Those are icons indicating the state of 'sync'. I see it on Google Drive files. Not sure if One
Drive has the same side effect.
Green circle with check means file is in sync with cloud.
https://netcomp.com.au/blog/get-to-know-the-microsoft-365-onedrive-status-icons/
--
Linux Mint 21.3 Cinnamon 6.0.4 Kernel 6.5.0-26-generic
Al

Big Al <alan@invalid.com> wrote:

> MajorLanGod wrote:
>
>> I just noticed wierd desktop icons today. Some of my folder icons are
>> overlaid with a green circle enompasing a checkmsrk with an underscore. I
>> will state upfront that I am NOT runing Onedrive, nor is it installed.
>>
>> What do they mean, and how can I remove them?
>>
>> [Fully updated Win11 23H2 Build 22631.33296
>
> Those are icons indicating the state of 'sync'. I see it on Google Drive files. Not sure if One
> Drive has the same side effect.
> Green circle with check means file is in sync with cloud.
> https://netcomp.com.au/blog/get-to-know-the-microsoft-365-onedrive-status-icons/

I concur. The problem is that programs may use the same position on the
object icon to show their overlay icon. I recall when Google Drive
(before it was renamed Google Backup and Sync and then back to Google
Drive) had a problem with another program that put its overlay icon in
the same corner of the object icon (e.g., folder or file icon). I also
remember there was a time when OneDrive and Google Drive, both installed
on my desktop, would conflict with each other trying to paint their
overlays at the same position on the object icon. The fix was to edit
the registry to change the order of the overlay handlers under
\HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers.
I had to rename the keys using numerical prefixes to get them sorted in
a different order than the programs created for those keys. I wanted
OneDrive's overlay icons to have priority over Google Drive's overlay
icons.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_shell_icon_overlay_identifiers

Don't know how extensive is the above list. It shows overlay icons for
Google Drive, OneDrive, and Dropbox which are the most likely candidates
for why the overlays show up.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/shell/icons-and-icon-overlays-bumper

I thought I read somewhere that there can be up to 15 overlay handlers.
That would definitely cause interference by having them overlap and
obliterate the object icon itself. There is no coordination in software
devs as to where they should position their overlay icon, so likely they
will interfere with each other.