Need explanation of W7 desktop pictures

[Art Todesco]

By right clicking on the desktop, going to personalize, you can put pics
to display in a slide show on the desktop (Desktop Background). If you
drag and drop a picture there, everything works as you'd expect. Now if
you delete one of the pics, by hitting the delete key (and answering yes
to the Recycle Bin), it's gone, that is to the Recycle Bin. So, I've
been dragging my pics from other directories (folders), while holding
the control key. This makes a exact copy of the file, so if I want to
delete it, I can without worrying about loosing the picture forever. So
today I though, well, why not just make a shortcut in the original
folder, drag it to the Desktop Background pane ... it won't take up as
much space, even though on the grand scheme of gigibytes and hard drive,
it's pretty insignificant, size wise. When I do this, it shows up for
a second, and then the icon in the Desktop Background pane disappears.
The picture stays on the current background. In order to see that
shortcut, I have to right click in the picture area of the Desktop
Background pane and go to properties, customize tab and finally, to
Choose File. There I see the shortcut. Is this just strange behavior
(a bug?) or is there some underlying reason? Not a big deal because I
can work around it by either accessing the background pics as above, or
just use a complete copy. Sorry for babbling on so long for something
that is probably pretty insignificant ... it was just bugging me.

 

[Dave \Crash\ Dummy]

By right clicking on the desktop, going to personalize, you can put
pics to display in a slide show on the desktop (Desktop Background).
If you drag and drop a picture there, everything works as you'd
expect. Now if you delete one of the pics, by hitting the delete key
(and answering yes to the Recycle Bin), it's gone, that is to the
Recycle Bin. So, I've been dragging my pics from other directories
(folders), while holding the control key. This makes a exact copy of
the file, so if I want to delete it, I can without worrying about
loosing the picture forever. So today I though, well, why not just
make a shortcut in the original folder, drag it to the Desktop
Background pane ... it won't take up as much space, even though on
the grand scheme of gigibytes and hard drive, it's pretty
insignificant, size wise. When I do this, it shows up for a second,
and then the icon in the Desktop Background pane disappears. The
picture stays on the current background. In order to see that
shortcut, I have to right click in the picture area of the Desktop
Background pane and go to properties, customize tab and finally, to
Choose File. There I see the shortcut. Is this just strange
behavior (a bug?) or is there some underlying reason? Not a big deal
because I can work around it by either accessing the background pics
as above, or just use a complete copy. Sorry for babbling on so long
for something that is probably pretty insignificant ... it was just
bugging me.

I think it has to do with the elimination of the active desktop. Only
static images are allowed. A shortcut acts like script, redirecting the
request.

 

[Char Jackson]

I think it has to do with the elimination of the active desktop. Only
static images are allowed. A shortcut acts like script, redirecting the
request.

On a bit of a tangent, it looks like it's possible to enable the
Dreamscene feature in Win 7 to allow video to run on the desktop
rather than be limited to static images. It's apparently not without
its quirks and issues, so use it with care.

<http://windows7center.com/tutorials/how-to-enable-dreamscene-in-windows-7/>