Data & storage

Deska stores its own state in a single application-data folder, one per operating system:

• macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Deska/
• Windows: %APPDATA%\Deska\
• Linux: ~/.config/Deska/

You never have to find it by hand. Settings and then Diagnostics lists six paths: the application data folder, the settings file, the keybindings file, the main log, the agent thread log and the agent worktrees, each with a Reveal button that opens it in your file manager.

The files you are most likely to care about:

• config.json: every preference from Settings, plus your list of workspaces, your recent projects, any saved layouts and the workspace you were last in, so Deska reopens there.
• keybindings.json: only the shortcuts you changed. Anything you never touched keeps following Deska’s defaults, so defaults can keep improving across updates. See Keyboard shortcuts.
• license.json: your cached sign-in, which is what lets Deska know your plan while offline.
• deska-notes/: the note vault, one markdown file per note. Move notes…, at the bottom of the Notes page or in Settings under Tools and Notes, moves every note to a folder you choose, including an Obsidian vault. Once moved, the notes live in that folder and this one is no longer read.
• deska-workspaces/: the layout and session state of every workspace, one folder per workspace, whether or not it is backed by a project folder.
• deska-snapshots/: rotating layout backups, up to fifty per workspace, behind the time scrubber.
• orchestration.sqlite: the transcript of every supervised agent thread, which is what makes the threads board history survive a restart. See Agent threads.
• panel-index/: Dex’s panel index, the model and what it read from your panels and tasks. Removing it in Settings under Dex deletes this folder; turning it back on downloads the model and reads everything again.
• worktrees/: the git worktrees Deska creates so agent threads can work without disturbing your checkout.

Alongside those sit smaller pieces of housekeeping: browser panel cookies and storage, terminal logs, downloaded canvas backgrounds, and this install’s device identity. None of it contains your source code.

Deska never copies your repositories into its own folder. It opens files in place, and what it keeps is layout and state: which panels are open, where they sit on the canvas, which terminals were running and in which directory.

That state lives in Deska’s own application-data folder, under deska-workspaces/, even for a workspace backed by a project folder. Deska does not write a .deska directory into your repository. If a project already ships a .deska/workspace.json, for example a layout a teammate committed, opening that folder imports it once as the starting layout and never writes back to it.

The whole application-data folder is plain files, so copying it is a valid backup. Close Deska first so nothing is being written while you copy.

• Worth keeping: config.json, keybindings.json, deska-notes/ (or the folder you moved your notes to) and deska-workspaces/. Those are the pieces you would actually miss.
• Safe to delete: deska-snapshots/, terminal logs, downloaded backgrounds and browser panel storage. Deska recreates them, and deleting them costs you history rather than work.
• Not worth syncing: worktrees/ and the browser partitions are tied to this machine and this checkout.

Settings, then General, then Reset holds Reset all settings, which restores every preference to its default in one go once you confirm. It rewrites config.json and nothing else.

It does not touch your project files, your notes, your snapshots, your agent thread history or your keybindings. Keybindings have their own reset, per shortcut or all at once, under Settings and Keybindings.

File reads and writes are checked against your workspace folders and the access you granted through the file explorer or a native file dialog. The file explorer can browse your local disk and lets you open and manage files in the folders you visit. A symbolic link does not, by itself, grant access to a file outside those locations.

When you open or save a file through a native file dialog, Deska remembers access to that file for the window. Saving an untitled editor outside every workspace therefore lets the next Save work without asking again.

Image previews have a separate, read-only exception: local PNG, JPEG, GIF and WebP images up to 10 MB can open outside those folders when the operating system allows Deska to read them. Deska checks the image format from the file itself. Previewing one does not grant editing access or access to its folder. Reopen an external preview to see later changes to the file. For larger images or other supported formats, open their folder in Deska’s file explorer and try again.

When a workspace is restored, its folder is checked again. A folder that has been moved, deleted or replaced is dropped rather than reopened, so an old session file can never hand back access to something you no longer trust. What leaves your machine, and when, is covered in Privacy & your data.