What Is This All About?

Going from this:

to this:

(Click on screenshots to show full size/enlarged)

(OK ignore the wallpaper in terms of this post)

I am sure everyone is familiar with the Windows Quick Launch Toolbar as part of the Taskbar. Dragging and dropping new shortcuts to it, or having them automatically installed as part of setting up a new program. Perhaps even dragging and dropping the icons in the Quick Launch area to get them into some sort of practical order. If you are like me it’s soon full of icons and you can’t remember what program they start so you rely on hovering the mouse cursor to get the tooltip. My own experience is that the tooltips don’t always work or take for ever to appear and it all becomes very frustrating. You want to show text and you can but then there isn’t enough space to get everything in!

How many of you know that there are lots of different things you can do with the existing toolbars and how easy it is to create new toolbars?

Not only that, but with a few simple “tricks” you can easily create a full cascading and autohiding menu system like the screenshot above to open programs, files and folders, complete with names and descriptions and without taking up valuable additional resources. It’s all built into the Windows XP operating system (Note to self – Must venture into the Darkside and install a Vista Test System ).

Why Would You Want To Do This?

(I mean experiment with toolbars, not install Vista)

if you are anything like me the answer is because you can, just because you like messing about with programs.

However there are also some sound practical reasons.

Pros:

• In a corporate environment you may be restricted in what you can install by corporate policy or by the way your IT department has tied down Windows. so you can’t install third party applications.
• This doesn’t use lots of precious resources as it’s part of the OS/Explorer
• It’s useful
• It’ increases productivity/getting things done
• It’s simple to use
• It’s easy to set up and change
• It’s versatile

Cons:

Loosing settings is easy

Backup needs a third party application or Windows Restore

Warning – You may inadvertently mess up your desktop settings which can be fiddly to get back the way you want it. If this concerns you set a restore point before you start – if you don’t know how click the Start button, then Help and Support type in restore point as so:

The Basics

I thought I would start with what many people will already know so as not to loose the interest of those who don’t (Remember we all start life knowing nothing, there are no stupid questions only stupid answers).

This will be Part 1 of a 2 part post.

Right clicking on “empty space” on the Windows Taskbar “Open Windows” area will reveal the following context menu:

For the purposes of the following tips/instruction you need to make sure that the Lock the Taskbar option does not have a tick against it

Like so:

Left click on the menu Lock the Taskbar item to change (Right click again to bring back the menu as it disappears when you left click, you will see the tick has now gone)

Also either minimise all open programs or preferably close them. This is because if they may get in the way of some of what we are trying to do – trust me I know through experience!

Clicking on the Properties menu item will reveal the following window:

I always use the autohide feature for the taskbar (where it only shows when you drag the mouse pointer to the bottom edge of the screen, or the edge where it is docked if you have moved it as will be explained later) You can also toggle the lock option, the Quick Launch Toolbar and other options using the checkboxes. (BTW – The Start Menu Tab gives options to the option to use the Classic start menu which I always use and customise – but then I’m a classic sought of guy, or did I mean classy? ).

If you don’t have the Quick Launch Toolbar displayed then click the checkbox in the Properties window or use the right click context menu – Toolbars submenu:

In the above example you will see there are several Toolbar options to choose from some of which are selected. Some of these toolbars such as the X1 Deskbar are added automatically by the installer for the program.

Try selecting some others that are available to you and see what happens, you can always deselect them without problems.

Right clicking on “empty space” the Quick Launch or any other Toolbar area gives a slightly different context menu:

This gives several useful options:

View – Lets you display Large or Small Icons – Try it and see

Show Text – Displays text with the icons – useful to avoid relying on Tooltips but takes up a lot of space:

Without Text:

With Text:

You can also select the title option:

(With or without the text option)

N.B This screenshot also shows the tooltip displayed when the mouse cursor is placed over an icon which gives the same information as the text option. The downside is that this is sometimes slow to display or may not show at all due to vagaries of Windows.

OK so that pretty much covers the basics.

Want to be a bit more Adventurous?

Sorry, you are going to have to wait for the really good stuff – see tomorrows post !!

What Other Posts are Relevant?

Why You Want to Use Portable Freeware Applications

TIP – Create Your Own Shutdown Tools Shortcuts

TIP – Stop Applications in Windows Stealing Focus

TIP – Disable or Control Windows Error Reporting

GTD – Getting Things Done

TaskSwitchXP – So Much More Than a Task Changer

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Technorati Tags: Toolbars, Launcher, Taskbar, Free Reviews, Impartial Review, Independent Review, Portable Freeware Applications, TweakUI, Windows, Windows XP

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This entry was posted on Thursday, April 24th, 2008 at 11:56 am and is filed under Hints & Tips, Windows OS. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.