Explanation needed why I have to download all files to my Mac now

Hi all,

Not a good time to post I know with Christmas upon us.

For a long time I have worked with my iCloud. To date, all my files have resided on my Mac hard drive and I assumed backed up to my cloud.

Now, it seems that everything is on my cloud and I am having to download files onto my hard drive in order to access, update, etc. This is is seriously slowing me down. Waiting for files to download is wasting valuable bandwidth and consuming my precious time.

Has something changed with the introduction of macOS Catalina?

Is there another reason for this (e.g. hard disk space)?

Is there a setting that allows all my files to be stored on my primary device, i.e. My Mac, and not the iCloud?

If this is not possible, then Dropbox becomes a much better option.

All the best for Christmas - Enjoy your break.

Perry