Corrupt Finder/Desktop

[kkinto]

I seem to be having a problem with a corrupt desktop/finder. Symptoms:
Cannot copy anything to or from desktop (endless "preparing to copy",
Cannot trash anything (same endless "preparing to"),
Cannot rename anything.
Force relaunch Finder doesn't help (file(s) now 'busy').
Saving to desktop from any app will hang that app.

Restart - clears and works for a bit, then back it comes.

iCloud desktop is off. Tried, recovery First Aid, NVRAM reset, finder prefs trashed, problem not present with another user so its in my user setup somewhere. I dont restart and reset lightly since I am using OpenCore on cMP.

Happened a few months back as well. Only way I could do anything was avoid desktop. Made new startup drive, fresh OS install, used migrate to get old user folder from Time Machine. HUUUGE MISTAKE. permissions nightmare, everything associated with old User name and Apps etc etc. Just a complete nightmare and will never do that again!

So now I am not sure what to do. Either I lose all my user settings and spend two days rebuilding from scratch (expecting this all to happen again soon as well - ie thats been proven NOT a viable solution)

Any ideas on what is happening here? Any way to completely "reset" the desktop/Finder? Thanks

 

[ApfelKuchen]

It may be best to copy your data to the new user account (just the files, of course, not the entire User account with its associated settings). The time you spend adjusting the preferences on the new user could turn out to be less than the time spent trying to find the cause of the current troubles. And it certainly seems better than continuing to wrestle with the existing issue on a day-to-day basis.

But if someone else knows exactly what to do for your issue, then it could turn out to be as easy as running a permissions fix or trashing some preference files.