Is there a windows 8 equivalent of 'Recent Items'/'My Recent Documents'?

Question

I used to use "Recent Items" and "My Recent Documents" in the start menu in previous versions of Windows to quickly open a recently opened document/activity.

Is there an equivalent aggregated list of recent documents in windows 8, or is it just per app?

If there isn't an equivalent, is there any way I can quickly access a list of recently accessed/opened/edited documents?

Answer 1

Yes, there is a way to do this: Just open the run dialog box by pressing Win + R and type in "recent". There you can see your recent activities.

Note: "Recent places" can be access under Windows Explorer's under "Favorite".

Also you can create a shortcut of the "recent" at your desktop and then pin it to start menu. For this just right click on desktop and seclect New>Shortcut. In file location type the path

C:/users/username/recent

and click the Next button, it will prompt the name and now click Finish. You will see the shortcut on desktop now and you can pin it to start menu. Also you can define Hotkey for this from properties now.

Answer 2

You can pin your apps (such as word or excel) to the taskbar. Once you do that, you'll have your recent item list for that app when you right click the icon.

Answer 3

That does not work. Typing recent into the Run command produces an error, "Windows cannot find 'recent'. Make sure you've typed the name correctly, then try again."

Anyway, Recent Places is not the same as Recent Documents. Launch File Explorer, there is a Recent Places link under Favourites. This includes all sorts of things that are not documents.

You could pin the associated application to the the Taskbar. You then right-click and see a jumplist of recent documents but this is application specific. All we want is an easily exposed method to see a menu list of recent documents that doesn't require you to launch a shortcut to a folder of other shortcuts. Windows 7 had this, Windows 8 does not.

Answer 4

1. Just open the run dialog box by pressing Win + R and type in "recent". There you can see your recent activities in the Explorer window.
2. In this Explorer window, right-click the icon for the “recent” path and choose Copy address.
3. Now, go to the Desktop and right-click and choose Paste shortcut. A shortcut icon pointing to “recent” will be created. You can now right-click this icon and choose Pin to start.

Answer 5

Another option is Win+F to bring up the file search tile - then type in the partial file name.

Answer 6

1. Open Windows Explorer, My Computer or press the Windows + E key.
2. Navigate to "C:\USERS\"USERNAME"\". "USERNAME" is the name you logged onto Windows with.
3. "The recent folder should be in the list shown.
4. Right-click on the folder and select pin to start.

The recent folder will now be on the start screen. When you open it you see all your recent files and folders. Right-click on any file for the context menu.

Answer 7

Since avirk's solution didn't work for me i searched further and found a similar solution at http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_cp-hardware/is-there-a-windows-8-recent-items-jump-list/27c7eb94-f3be-4046-8298-dc477c868dcf

It sais you can access the recent files via

C:\Users\[YourName]\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Recent

I had to navigate manually to the location but then i could drag the folder to the "Favorites" icon.

So i finally got a working solution now.