Moving Files Safely?

What is safer:
Move a file by:

Dragging & Dropping?
-or-
By Copy & Paste?

Are there any Do's or Dont's to be concerned with?

We are approaching a Release where this action should be involved
with new and/or old files.

It's up to you.

I prefer copy and paste due to twitchy fingers lifting up and depositing files in the wrong place when dragging and dropping.

There doesn't appear to be any indication of anything soon(tm) on the horizon, but backing up data is a good plan anyway and should be done more often than not.

Years ago in the DOS days, I used Norton Commander, for file management
Later in Windows I found a replacement in Windows Commander
Now its called Total Commander.
Have to move, copy so many files dayly, that a filemanager with 2 windows is very handy
you always know where you are, can compare directories easy etc.


Use a method you feel comfy with and that you know works.

Keep in mind with Drag and Drop, that if you are working on the SAME Drive, it defaults to MOVE and will delete the files from the original location. Between two drives, the default is COPY, and it will leave the original files in place. To be safe, I always right-click and drag instead of left-click. Then, when you right-click, drag and drop, it will ask you if you want to MOVE or COPY.

Forester1 said:

Keep in mind with Drag and Drop, that if you are working on the SAME Drive, it defaults to MOVE and will delete the files from the original location.

Click to expand...

In this case (same partition) Windows only modifies the MFT. Files stay where they are, no file is moved or deleted.

That may be, that the pointers are just changed, but the appearance to the end user is as described.