Get More Out of Your Windows Taskbar with Its Built-In Toolbars

Hearing the words "extra toolbars" may make you squirm in fear, but a few readers show us how handy Windows' built-in taskbar toolbars can be.

We recently showed you three useful tricks for organizing your messy Windows taskbar, and you guys came out in full force with lots of your own tips. Multiple readers, though, wrote tips about the taskbar's capacity for extra toolbars?a tip that's old as dirt, but we haven't covered since the XP days, so we thought it time to revisit it.

To create a new toolbar, first create a folder with shortcuts to the apps you want on your new toolbar. Then, right-click on the taskbar , and go to Toolbars > New Toolbar. Choose the folder you just created and drag it wherever you like on the taskbar (you may need to right click and uncheck "Lock the Taskbar" to do this).

So what can you do with this feature? A few readers offer some suggestions. JessAskin likes to use it to create built-in separators:

No need for fancy software to create a separator. Just create a desktop folder called Toolbars, and inside that, more folders such as Audio, Work and Art. Put your shortcuts into each subfolder (for example, put Audacity and CDEx into Audio, Word and Komposer into Work, and Photoshop and a shortcut to your fave art website in Art). Add each subfolder as a toolbar and voila! You have a sectioned taskbar with each of your grouped apps! Double-height your taskbar, and you've got even more room.

Stevenholt68 creates a double taskbar with even more room for his favorite apps:

I love this trick and have used it for several years. I don't like a cluttered desktop that has program icons on it, so my desktop only has files and folders for stuff I am currently working on. I take shortcuts to all my programs and put the shortcuts inside a folder. Then, I turn that folder into a toolbar and drag my taskbar and drag it upward to make it double-height. It shows up like this, then I right click on that toolbar and make the icons small.

And, of course, you can always compress those shortcuts down into a Start-like menu using Quick Launch, as done by RepentTheEndIsExtremelyFkingNigh:

Someone please tell me you can use quick launch on Windows 8, because I hate desktop shortcuts, pinning them or having to look through my Start Menu.

(Yes, you can still use Quick Launch in Windows 8).

There you have it: just a few more ways you can keep your taskbar clean, organized, and useful using nothing but Windows' built-in features.

Every week, we receive tons of reader tips, often in response to tips we've posted. Our Tip of the Week showcases our favorite tip from you that improves upon something else we've shared, shows us another way to do something, or otherwise deserves more attention than our regular tips roundups. Got a tip to share? Post it over at our tips forum or send it to us at tips@lifehacker.com.

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~3/ZroRgNLM62I/get-more-out-of-your-windows-taskbar-with-its-built+in-toolbars

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