Ubuntu 18.04 GUI File Manager Weirdness

Wed Jul 3 19:57:18 UTC 2019

On Wed,  3 Jul 2019 14:34:12 -0400 (EDT), Robert Heller wrote:
>What is shown on the desktop is what I get when I use a terminal and
>do a 'ls Desktop' (except with the icons).

On the desktop there are not the folders of a user's home, there are
either regular links, files with information about the location or
there's nothing at all, even if it's shown on the GUI desktop.

What's the output of

  ls -Al Desktop/

?