How do you organize your computer?

I’m referring to where you keep vital documents, downloads, pictures, and videos.

Do you allow programs to manage where these items are stored? [Otherwise, if you had to find the actual file, would you be clueless as to where it was?]

Or do you tell programs where to store files? [You could pull the file up at will without the program.]

Personally, I’m very totalitarian when it comes to my files. I store all vital files on a separate partition/hard drive, and tell programs where they can find the files. I don’t like programs that create duplicates for the sake of convenience. This even extends to installs, I rarely install in the Program Files folder of windows or the Home folder of Linux. On the mac I’m pretty lax :)