data/sessions/explorer-move-to-folder/memory.md

Memory: explorer-move-to-folder

Overview

Move a file into a subfolder through the file manager's context menu, leaving nothing behind. Use this when a file has to be relocated by pointing. The route cuts the file from its context menu — which marks it rather than removing it — opens the destination folder, and pastes inside, which is what completes the move. The recorded trace leaves report.pdf in dest\ only.

Prerequisites

• A desktop environment with a file manager, or a shell.
• A file to move and a destination folder, both existing before the task starts and both identifiable by name.
• Write access to both the source folder and the destination. A move deletes from one and creates in the other, so read access to the file alone is not enough.
• Clarity that the result is a move, not a copy. Nothing must remain at the source when the task finishes.
• No file of the same name already in the destination — it is overwritten without a useful warning, and the original is gone by then, so the overwritten data is unrecoverable.
• Both locations on the same volume, where that can be arranged. A move within a volume renames an entry; a move across volumes copies and then deletes, which takes time proportional to the file and can fail partway.

Steps

Step 1 — Right-click at (250, 386)

The task is to relocate report.pdf into another folder, so it should end up in exactly one place. Move the cursor and Right-click report.pdf in corpus-seed to select it and open its context menu.

Step 2 — Move-cursor at (294, 620)

Move the cursor onto the Cut row first, without clicking. Hovering before clicking is what makes the click land reliably, and it leaves the target highlighted in the next frame for verification.

Step 3 — Left-click at (294, 620)

Move the cursor and Left-click Cut. This marks the file for relocation rather than duplication, which is what "move" means; Copy sits 22 px below and would leave the original behind. The row stays visible in the listing afterwards — Windows keeps it until the paste completes — so its continued presence does not mean the cut failed.

Step 4 — Double-click at (212, 133)

Move the cursor and Double-click dest, the top row of the listing, to open the destination folder. A cut is only completed by a paste, so the view has to travel to where the file should end up.

Step 5 — Right-click at (900, 600)

dest\ is empty, so the menu has to be opened from blank space in the file pane rather than from an item.

Step 6 — Move-cursor at (948, 739)

Move the cursor onto the Paste row before clicking.

Step 7 — Left-click at (948, 739)

Move the cursor and Left-click Paste. This completes the move: the file is written into dest\ and removed from corpus-seed, so it exists in exactly one place. Only now does the source row disappear from the parent folder.

Notes & Edge Cases

1. Nothing has moved until the paste. The first half only marks the file, so an interruption between the two leaves everything where it was — which is the safe failure, and also the reason a half-finished move shows no sign of itself.
2. Cut and copy sit next to each other in the same menu and produce identical-looking destinations. The only way to tell a move from a copy afterwards is that the source folder no longer holds the file, so confirm there rather than in the folder just opened.
3. The paste lands in whatever folder the window is showing, not in whatever is selected. Opening the destination is the step that decides the outcome; if it silently failed, the file is pasted back where it started and the task looks finished.
4. A move that overwrites a same-named file at the destination replaces it, and the original is gone by then. Check the destination for that name before pasting — unlike a copy there is nothing left to recover from.
5. A cut file usually stays visible, sometimes dimmed, until the paste completes. Its still being there is not evidence the first half failed.
6. A dimmed paste entry means the clipboard is empty and the first half did not land. It is a report rather than a rendering quirk.
7. Move to the target and click as separate actions, and prefer the keyboard equivalents of both halves when the selection is already correct.