Just as Vista works to keep the desktop as clean as possible, it also does the same with the taskbar. The technique for doing this is to group related program items into a single button that expands when you click it.
For example, if you have seven Word documents open at once, chances are (barring a really large taskbar and no other open programs) that Vista will group these Word instances into a single taskbar button. This reduces the overall number of taskbar buttons, in turn reducing taskbar clutter. Click on the Word button, and all the open documents appear in a list.
Of course, whether you use the taskbar grouping is entirely up to you. If you want each document represented by its own taskbar button, you can instruct Vista not to use the grouping behavior. Here’s how to change the default Vista settings:
Open the Taskbar and Start Menu Properties dialog box as instructed previously. (Fine; those instructions were to right-click the Start button and choose Properties.)
Figure 4-11. Turning off grouping of taskbar buttons
(To turn off grouping, clear the “Group similar taskbar buttons” checkbox.)
Changing the grouping behavior will not affect the Windows Flip or Windows Flip 3D method of switching among open files. In the case of seven Word documents open at once, as previously introduced, each one still appears as its own item in Windows Flip.
Also, the grouping comes into play only when there’s no more room on the taskbar for additional buttons. If you’ve got only two instances of an application open and nothing else, they won’t group.
Not only can the taskbar house buttons to let you switch among open applications, but it also can host entire toolbars that can add a significant amount of functionality. One example of such a toolbar is the Quick Launch toolbar, discussed next.
In Windows XP, you could add the Desktop Search toolbar. Because of the integration of Desktop Search in Windows Vista, this toolbar is not available on Vista machines.
It’s been a favorite way for me to launch programs for some time, and it can certainly be used from the Vista desktop as well: the Quick Launch toolbar. It stores program shortcuts in a little icon, and it allows for single-click launching of the applications you use most frequently.
This taskbar toolbar should be enabled by default at Vista installation time, but you might be inheriting a computer in which it’s been turned off. In that case, you’ll probably need the appropriate click-steps.
Here’s how to display the Quick Launch toolbar:
Right-click an empty area on the taskbar and point to Toolbars.
To add the Quick Launch toolbar, just make sure there’s a check next to the Quick Launch menu option. To remove the Quick Launch toolbar, remove the checkmark.
By default, you should see three icons in the Quick Launch toolbar: Show Desktop, Switch between Windows, and Internet Explorer. But of course, the idea is to place frequently used programs at your fingertips without even having to open the Start menu, as seen in Figure 4-12.
Figure 4-12. Using the Quick Launch toolbar
Adding a program to the Quick Launch toolbar
Of course, users can manipulate the Quick Launch toolbar to contain the programs that are most helpful to them. Fortunately, it’s very easy to add more programs to the taskbar.
Here’s how:
Locate the program you want to add on the Start menu or on the desktop.
Right-click the program icon and drag it to the Quick Launch toolbar. A context menu appears, giving you the option of moving the item or copying it. (A left-click should work as well when dragging to the Quick Launch toolbar, although you won’t get any choices in a context menu.)
You can do this with just about any program shortcut, from just about anywhere on your computer. One alternative method is to let programs install desktop shortcuts (many will if you don’t customize the installation), and then just left-click and drag the shortcut to the Quick Launch toolbar.
Removing the Quick Launch item, then, is a breeze. Just right-click the Quick Launch shortcut and choose Delete from the context menu.
Restoring Show Desktop in the Quick Launch toolbar
If deleting a Quick Launch icon is easy, how about restoring one? If you’re using a shortcut to an application, the procedure is the same as adding a new shortcut: just drag and drop the shortcut from some other location. Easy cheesy.
But what about the Show Desktop button? This is a very useful Quick Launch button, as it minimizes all open windows with a single click, saving users the labor of minimizing and/or resizing windows to access something on the desktop, such as a recently downloaded file. And once the desktop has been shown, the button can be used again to quickly toggle back to the working environment, again saving a bunch of window recalls and/or resizing.
But although this is cool and very functional, the Show Desktop Quick Launch button isn’t really an application, is it? In reality, it’s just a pointer to a script, and although it’s not necessarily easy to re-create the Show Desktop button, you can do it by following a few simple steps. After all, other than looking for a way to enhance your biceps, that’s why you picked up this book.
To restore the Show Desktop button, you will need to re-create a file called Show Desktop.scf and make sure it’s stored in the right location. Here’s what to do:
Open Microsoft WordPad (in the Accessories folder) and then enter these lines of text:
As discussed previously, %UserProfile% is a variable designating the user’s profile filesystem location. Usually, the profile is stored under the C:\Users\username directory. If you’re not sure where the profile is located, you can find out by opening a Command Prompt window and typing set userprofile. The command returns the path for the currently logged-on user.
Another way you can customize the Vista taskbar is by adding (or removing) one or more toolbars. The idea of a toolbar is to place commonly accessed information within easy reach. By default, users have these toolbars available:
Address toolbar
This places an address box directly in the taskbar, similar to what is seen in Internet Explorer. In fact, it’s used in the same way. Users can simply type a Uniform Resource Locator (URL) into the Address bar for any given resource. This resource can exist on the local machine, the Web, or the local network.
Once the path is specified, Vista automatically launches the appropriate application for viewing the file (i.e., if the URL specifies a web page, Vista calls Internet Explorer; if it’s a path to a PowerPoint presentation stored on a network share, Vista launches PowerPoint instead). And just like the Address bar in Internet Explorer, the taskbar’s version also tries to suggest possible locations after the first few letters, saving the user from having to type the entire path. With frequent use, the Address bar can save a lot of time when accessing frequently used files and web sites.
Links toolbar
If you find yourself using the Favorites folder often as a way to get quick access to the web sites you need, you might consider adding the Links toolbar. This provides access to the Links folder in the Favorites menu of Internet Explorer. You can then add links to other resources, no matter where they live, by dragging and dropping shortcuts onto the Links toolbar. For example, users could quickly access a fileserver’s folder of working files simply by creating a shortcut on the Links toolbar, making the resource only a few clicks away.
Desktop toolbar
If desktop shortcuts are your thing, you might find it very useful to use the Desktop toolbar. This toolbar places all the desktop shortcuts you’ve created into one toolbar. This comes in especially handy when you’re working with several windows that are hiding your normal desktop shortcuts. The Desktop toolbar provides easy access to all these shortcuts without having to minimize all open windows, thus interrupting your work.
Quick Launch toolbar
This wonderful little toolbar provides one-click access to commonly used applications. Also, this is the only taskbar toolbar shown by default. We’ll discuss the Quick Launch toolbar in more detail in the sections that follow.
So, how do you use any/all of these toolbars? It’s easy; just right-click on an empty area of the taskbar, point to the Toolbars menu item in the context menu, and then place a checkmark next to the toolbar you want to use. Uncheck the item to remove the toolbar.
Note also that all of the taskbar toolbars have a title to go along with them, with the exception of the Quick Launch toolbar. If you’d like to hide the toolbar titles, just right-click the toolbar and deselect the Show Title command, as seen in Figure 4-13.
Figure 4-13.Deselecting the toolbar titles
In most computing environments, you’ll see more than just the Address, Links, Desktop, and Quick Launch toolbars. Several other applications also create their own taskbar toolbar at installation time, and you can enable and disable these other toolbars using the techniques previously discussed. Media playback applications such as iTunes and Windows Media Player come immediately to mind. Applications such as Microsoft’s Encarta also create a toolbar at installation time.
Adding a custom toolbar
You can create a custom toolbar to suit almost any shortcut purpose you can envision. These custom toolbars are based on existing folders, and the toolbar shortcuts are then determined by the folder contents.
Here’s how to create a personalized toolbar for either yourself or other users to obtain easy access to resources:
As before, right-click an empty area of the taskbar and choose the Toolbars menu option. Click New Toolbar.
Once you click OK, the selected folder becomes a new toolbar that you can toggle on and off just as you can any of the other taskbar toolbars. The toolbar contents are the same as the folder contents. And remember that the toolbar root folder doesn’t necessarily have to exist on the local machine. Creating a custom toolbar can be yet another easy way to get quick access to network files.
Figure 4-14. Adding a custom toolbar
Once you create a custom toolbar, though, it’s good practice to lock the taskbar (right-click and choose Lock the Taskbar from the context menu). That’s because the toolbar, unfortunately, doesn’t become part of the user profile. When you close the custom toolbar, Vista loses track of it, and you must re-create it to use it once again.
Look to the lower-right side of the taskbar (unless you’ve moved the taskbar location). There, among other items, you’ll see the system clock, the volume indicator, and maybe a battery indicator on a laptop machine. There’s a name for this taskbar section as well. The flotilla of icons you see there is called the System Tray, also known as the Notification Area (presumably because Vista, like Windows XP, has a habit of displaying little balloon notifications from this area).
The System Tray is populated by icons that indicate applications, or at least certain application components, that were loaded at startup. Hovering the mouse pointer over one of these icons should produce a little ScreenTip that lets you know the purpose of the icon.
To manipulate application behavior, just right-click the desired application icon. For example, you can adjust sound properties by right-clicking the speaker icon and choosing the appropriate action (if you want to turn the volume up or down, try the Volume Mixer).
Several other programs, such as Windows Live Messenger, also load at startup time and place an icon in the System Tray. By right-clicking on the System Tray icon, you can usually either open the program itself or get quick access to a properties dialog box where you can tweak startup behavior. In the case of Windows Live Messenger, you can open the application, and then access an Options dialog box from the Tools menu where you can tell the application not to load every time Vista starts up (see Figure 4-15).
Figure 4-15.Controlling application startup behavior via the System Tray
Why is all this important? Because each background application that shows in the System Tray is also using at least some system resources. Governing which applications load in the background can be an important part of tuning startup and shutdown performance (open applications close during a normal shutdown), and the System Tray is a great indicator.
Just because an application loads at startup time doesn’t necessarily mean it also places a corresponding icon in the System Tray. To get a better handle on what programs load during system startup, use the Msconfig utility (msconfig.exe). I discuss the Msconfig utility in Chapter 6.
There are a couple of ways to manage what happens in the System Tray. One is to change the properties of the application so that it doesn’t load and place an icon there in the first place. But we just discussed that. For icons that aren’t necessarily applications that load, such as the system clock, you can also change the behavior of the System Tray, which we’ll discuss next.
Changing System Tray Behavior
To change the general behavior of the System Tray, you can access the Notification Area tab in the Taskbar and Start Menu Properties dialog box. If you’ve been reading this chapter, you already know how to get there. If not, follow these steps:
Right-click the Start button or an empty area of the taskbar and choose Properties.
The Taskbar and Start Menu Properties dialog box appears. Make sure the Notification Area tab is chosen.
You can turn off icons for the volume, clock, power, and network by unchecking the appropriate checkboxes in the “System icons” section of the Notification Area screen.
The big one here is the default setting to “Hide inactive icons.” Checking this box (or, more technically, leaving it checked) hides most of the System Tray icons behind a little arrow button. Clicking this arrow button expands the full list of System Tray icons. Unchecking this box can have a significant effect on the usable space available to the rest of the taskbar.
For additional manipulation of just the system clock, you can right-click an empty area of the System Tray (or the time reading) and choose Adjust Date and Time. The Date and Time dialog box opens. Use the Additional Clocks tab to configure more options.
In this same dialog box, you may have also noticed a Customize button, discussed in the following section.
Please check back next week for the continuation of this article.
BrainDump 
Visual Studio .NET
