desktop icons position changing

Thanks for your bug report. Which version of Ubuntu and nautilus do you use? Could this possibly be: http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=330298 ?

Looks like it. Here is some further investigation I have done:

1) this only applies to the home, computer, trash, volumes and network mounts icons
2) this is a spacing issue. If I leave a lot of spacing around those icons, they don't move. Otherwise, they will reset at each login.

Does it match the description and the screenshot of the GNOME bugzilla?

Not perfectly. Only his home icon is moved, and ALL of mine are moved (well if I use them like I normally would). Don't you have this problem also?

No, I don't have the issue, but I've some other icons on the desktop too, I use dapper and I autosort by name the desktop. Do you use the autosorting or do you move they by hand? What version of Ubuntu do you use?

This is only on my dapper drake laptop. I keep it up to date a few times a day, and last time I checked this behavior was... well.. a few days ago I guess.

I don't use autosorting (WHAT? there is a feature for it!?). I tried with or without "keep icons aligned" (grid snapping) but it doesn't make any difference. So yes, I place icons by hand, that's why this bug is annoying.

Same problem in both my pc and my laptop on Dapper (up to date version). The problem is at least two months old. The icons don't move in every constellation but it is virtually impossible to make sense out of the behavior of those icons. Currently I am just trying to move them around until I find a stable position.

Now that my desktop is Dapper Drake too, it has this problem. Just to keep you informed that it's not machine-specific for me.

What locale do you use?

canadian french on one, and normal english (canadian? I guess) on the other.

I've some positionning changing with a fr_FR.UTF-8 locale but not with a C locale, maybe that's locale dependend

That upload fixes some desktop positioning issues, could you try with it?

 nautilus (2.13.92-0ubuntu1) dapper; urgency=low
 .
   * New upstream version:
     - Better filename linebreaking at punctuation marks.
     - List view: If a rename moves the file in the view,
       scroll to the new position
     - Better handling of broken filename encoding for link targets
     - Some desktop icon positioning fixes
     - Browser mode: don't close window on up if current directory
       has been removed
     - Pass original files, not target files to property page providers.
       This allows property page extensions to look at desktop files
       and symlinks.
     - Various small optimizations
     - Leak fixes
     - Build fixes
   * debian/control.in:
     - updated the requirement on gnome-vfs2 according to configure

Just an update: as of March 17, the bug is still present (filed by me as #33814, then pointed here by Sebastien.)

Bug #31881 still unchanged for me.

Yep, same thing still occurs here also. Very annoying.

I'm running up to date Dapper, originally from Flight 5 with UK English Locale set.

According to upstream this version fixes the issue:

 nautilus (2.14.1-0ubuntu1) dapper; urgency=low
 .
   * New upstream version:
     - Translation updates
     - Code cleanups
     - Use --no-desktop option for all desktop files
     - Startup performance improvements
     - Make files copied from read-only source writeable
     - Don't allow bookmarking x-desktop:///
     - Add help buttons to several dialogs
     - Fix SVG file identification
     - Properly break down URIs for connect to server ui
     - Don't reposition icons on reload (Ubuntu: #31236)
     - Show unmounted but user-visible drives in the places sidebar
     - Display more info in the progress dialog when preparing
     - Smarter DnD target selection
     - Smaller close icon in the sidebar title
     - GnomeGoals: Use po/LINGUAS
     - Fix icons not updated on theme change (Ubuntu: #35483)
   * debian/patches/01_lpi.patch,
     debian/patches/02_autoconf.patch:
     - updated
   * debian/patches/06_documents_place.patch:
     - don't list the Documents place if the userdir is used for desktop
       (Ubuntu: #38663)

Let we know if that works for you or if you still get the issue. Closing for now assuming that upstream is right, feel free to reopen if that's not fixed for you

> According to upstream this version fixes the issue:

Confirmed on two different machines, thanks!