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Desktop Tips

HIDING DESKTOP ICONS

Once you have a nice interesting background on your Desktop, wouldn't it be nice to be able to hide all those shortcuts to programs and other icons, like My Computer, Internet Explorer, the Recycle bin? Well, if you have Windows 98, and you have the Active Desktop option enabled (your Desktop is viewed as a web page), you can. Get to the Display Properties window, by right clicking on an empty space on your Desktop and selecting Properties from the context menu that scrolls out, then click on the Effects tab, and then click to put a check mark next to the item for "hide icons when the desktop is viewed as a web page." Finally, click on "OK" to exit the Display Properties dialog, and now you will see your pretty picture filling out your entire display, with no messy icons partially hiding it. (And if you choose the option to "auto-hide" your taskbar, it's even better.)

But now, how do you get to those icons that are hidden on your Desktop? My method is to use a freeware program called QuickRun, which puts a little icon near the Tray area of your Taskbar, which can be clicked in order to launch a menu of all the contents of the Desktop (whether they're hidden or not, they're still present.) The menu is very similar to the Start Menu launched when you click the Start button on the Taskbar, but it contains only whatever items are on your Desktop. There is also an option to have another icon on the Taskbar which allows quick launching of all the different applets in the Control Panel. This free program can be found at the following address:

http://www.partridgesoft.com

If you have Windows 95, then the option for hiding Desktop shortcuts and other icons is not available to you in the Display item of Control Panel. But you can still choose to do this, if you run another freeware utility, called DeskSweeper. When this program has been installed, and you have chosen the option of adding it to your Startup folder, it will install a small icon in your System Tray area of the Taskbar which you can click in order to toggle your Desktop icons hidden or not. At the same time, if you right-click that DeskSweeper icon, you get a menu of several other useful options, including: start up Windows Explorer, Shut down the computer, Restart the computer, and Minimize all windows now. The program may be downloaded from this address:

http://www.no-nonsense-software.com.