For better or worse, my digital file organization and storage strategy mimics what you’d find on my desk in real life: clutter. There isn't much to be done for my physical desktop, but the marvel of modern technology means it doesn't matter if my MacBook Pro’s desktop is littered with dozens and dozens of files and images.
Or does it?
Theoretically, there is no real need to painstakingly name my files or employ a meticulous, labyrinthine file hierarchy. Oh sure, it would be nice, and it might make my (digital) life just a bit neater and tidier. But why bother, when the simple keyboard shortcut command-spacebar brings up Spotlight, allowing you to search locally stored documents, applications, emails, images, calendar events, and even web surfing history for a specific keyword. From its dropdown menu of results, you can swiftly launch an app or open a file. See that desktop above? I can find anything I need in about a second.
Spotlight means I never use Launchpad, the icon grid view of apps introduced in OS X Lion, or the applications folder. Heck, I rarely even launch things from the Dock. And if you want to streamline your productivity a bit more, an app like Alfred can make it easy to accomplish specific tasks by letting you set up other keyboard commands.
Practically, however, that unruly mess of icons on your desktop does create a problem with system performance. Because of how OS X handles graphics (specifically with virtual memory allocation), a desktop fully stocked with files and applications will eventually start slowing your machine down. Womp. Luckily, if you're a virtual hoarder like me, there's a couple easy tools you can use to straighten things out with fairly minimal effort -- and if you're like me, the less effort, the better.
Hazel is a masterful application for automatically storing files in particular places based on rules you create. For example, you could have Hazel monitor your Downloads folder, and whenever you download a .jpg or .png, it goes straight into your Pictures folder instead. If you just want to dump all those Desktop files into some other folder, an app like Launchbar will let you quickly launch applications or files by typing short abbreviations -- like a more robust Spotlight search, with a number of other useful features tossed in as well.
If you still want all those files on your desktop, you can use Desktop Groups to keep related files lumped together. This requires more continual manual maintenance and upkeep than something like Hazel, so it may be more useful for someone who routinely organizes their desktop.
And if you really don't care about uncluttering your desktop, but your coworkers are giving you grief, you can use Shade to draw a virtual shade over your messy desktop and create the illusion of a pristine workspace.
