At times you might be willing to restore or backup the recently or frequently accessed files, folders or Websites within a click on the desktop taskbar. Windows allows you to access files and other recently opened folders from the jump list. This feature was introduced first in Windows 7 and later OS. Jump list are not just shortcuts to files, but also provides quick access to restore them within a click. Here is the tutorial how you can BackUp and Restore items from Jump Lists in Windows 8.
Windows jump lists allows you to access directly or jump right to the documents, images, music or websites. It lists pinned items, recent items, and frequent places of your recently opened files, folders, etc. upon opening the Windows Explorer and clicking on the File tab.
Here is how you can restore the recent items, frequent places, and pinned items in system taskbar and File Explorer Jump Lists from your user account in Windows 8.
If you are a geek in dealing with computer programs or well aware of the programming or functioning of your Windows 8 system, then you must be aware that all jump Lists and pinned items, recent items, and frequent places are saved in the following folder locations
shell:Recent\AutomaticDestinations
Shell:Recent\CustomDestinations
The tutorial is all about backing up these two folder locations automatically.
Steps to Back Up Pinned items, Recent items, and Frequent places in Windows 8
- To restore the files recently opened, you need to create a .bat file, to do so open notepad and copy the entries given below
mkdir “%userprofile%\Desktop\Jump-Lists-Backup\AutomaticDestinations”
copy /y “%APPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Recent\AutomaticDestinations” “%userprofile%\Desktop\Jump-Lists-Backup\AutomaticDestinations”
mkdir “%userprofile%\Desktop\Jump-Lists-Backup\CustomDestinations”
copy /y “%APPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Recent\CustomDestinations” “%userprofile%\Desktop\Jump-Lists-Backup\CustomDestinations”
- Next, save the file to desktop with a name Back-Up-Jump-Lists.bat, make sure the extension is .bat.
- Now, run the .bat file.
You can now see your desktop screen flickering as the explorer is restarts a Jump-Lists-Backup folder appears on your desktop containing all backup for Pinned items, Recent items, and Frequent visited places listed in the jump lists.
Steps to restore Pinned items, Recent items, and Frequent places in Windows 8
With the Jump-Lists-Backup folder still on the desktop, create a .bat file to restore jump lists.
- Open note pad and copy the following entries
mkdir “%userprofile%\Desktop\Jump-Lists-Backup\AutomaticDestinations”
copy /y “%APPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Recent\AutomaticDestinations” “%userprofile%\Desktop\Jump-Lists-Backup\AutomaticDestinations”
mkdir “%userprofile%\Desktop\Jump-Lists-Backup\CustomDestinations”
copy /y “%APPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Recent\CustomDestinations” “%userprofile%\Desktop\Jump-Lists-Backup\CustomDestinations”
- Now save the file with a name Restore-Jump-Lists.bat and Run it.
Upon running the files, you can get all the backed up Pinned items, Recent items, and Frequent places restored to your Windows 8 Jump Lists.
Since, all the files and folders in the jump list are the shortcuts, so make sure that the files and folders are not moved from their original position.
So, if you wish to backup or restore recently used files or folders, etc. in Windows 8, follow the tutorial here.
