Tip of the day: Give your taskbar twice as much room

This is one of my all-time favorite Windows tips, and it’s one of the first customizations I make on a new computer.

After you open more than three or four programs, you’ll have trouble seeing which file or program goes with each taskbar button. Here’s a great solution: increase the height of the taskbar to two lines (or even three), so you can see more buttons. Aim the mouse pointer at the top edge of the taskbar until it turns to a two-headed arrow, then drag up to create an extra row. If your screen resolution is 1024 X 768, you have room for at least two rows; at higher resolutions, you can comfortably use three rows.

After you finish this tweak, you’ll be able to see more taskbar buttons and their text labels. You’ll also find that the small icons in the Quick Launch bar and the system notification area (the “tray” at the right of the taskbar) stack up as well, giving you a lot more room in these areas, too. Even the clock changes appearance. With a two-line taskbar, you see today’s day and date along with the current time.

You may need to unlock the taskbar before you can make any changes. To do so, right-click the system clock and clear the check mark next to Lock the Taskbar). You may also need to “unhide” the Quick Launch bar (right-click any empty space on the taskbar, click the Toolbars menu, and select the Quick Launch option). Drag the right edge of the Quick Launch bar to make it wide enough to hold your icons. Remember to lock the taskbar after you finish.

How I use Gmail (new invitations available too!)

Gmail just doubled its storage limit to 2GB, with the promise of more to come. I use my Gmail account for a very specific purpose. I have e-mail newsletters and summaries of daily postings from my favorite newsgroups delivered to that address. I use filters to automatically tag each entry (the equivalent of moving it to a folder) and archive it (so my inbox isn’t cluttered). The advantage is that I have an easily accessible, searchable archive of this material, which is often useful for my professional research.

For searching through Windows-related newsgroups, I prefer Microsoft’s Web-based reader. (Bookmark this site, because it’s hard to get to from Microsoft’s main site.)

For newsgroups in other areas, or for those I want to follow daily, I set up a subscription in Google Groups and have either an abridged version or a full digest sent to my Gmail account. When I’m looking for information on a specific topic in that area, I can search using my Gmail account and find exactly what I’m looking for).

By the way, I have 50 more Gmail invitations to hand out. If you want one, send an email to edbott (at) gmail.com.

Bloglines unveils new translation

I just received this news release from Bloglines :

Bloglines, the world’s most popular free online service for searching, subscribing, publishing and sharing news feeds, blogs and rich web content, today opened the doors of its service to audiences beyond our solar system with a new translation in Klingon, the galaxy’s fastest-spreading invented language.

“The custom of sharing grand stories of conquest and battle has a long standing history among the Klingon people,” said Mark Fletcher, founder of Bloglines. “Blogging is simply an easy way to continue the tradition while stuck in deep space, away from your family. We feel that presenting Bloglines in the Warrior Tongue was long overdue.”

Klingon marks the eighth language translation for Bloglines, joining Chinese, English, French, German, Japanese, Portuguese and Spanish. To navigate Bloglines in Klingon, simply select the language from the menu on the left hand side of the Bloglines home page. To find out more about the Klingon language, visit http://www.kli.org/ or check with your local Klingon embassy. Qapla’!

I wish I knew how to say April Fool’s in Klingon.