Coolest Windows 7 Tips and Tricks – Taskbar Shortcuts and Tweaks

Posted by: Umair H. Peracha 29 July 2010 8 Comments

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Microsoft Windows 7 is undoubtedly one of the best Operating Systems ever produced and keeping in mind the reputation of Microsoft, this OS is certainly one hell of a software.

When we say that Microsoft Windows 7 is the best OS then we must prove it too, right? Keep on reading to learn more on why Windows 7 is the best OS out there.

We bring you some of the most Coolest Tips and Tricks for Microsoft Windows 7. Windows 7 comes per-equipped with a lot of Perks. In this post, we’ll be exploring a few of them related to Taskbar.

What is Taskbar?

Taskbar is the most fundamental part of Windows Desktop. It host the most important Menu of your PC, Start Menu. In addition to that, it used to have Buttons representing Open Programs and well as a section dedicated to background jobs.

But in Windows 7, the philosophy of Taskbar has been changed . In windows 7, the Taskbar not only hosts icons for open programs but also shortcuts to those programs. The background jobs are still there but hidden. The start menu has been redefined, keeping in mind the usability of both beginners and expert users.

Windows 7 Taskbar Perks

Shift + Click

It opens new instance of the program. i.e. Whenever I click on explorer, a new explorer window will be opened every time.

Middle Click

It does the same as Shift + Click. The Middle Click button on your mouse is the button that you use to scroll pages UP and Down. It is the very button that you use to open Hyper links in new Tabs.

Ctrl + Shift + Click

This does the same as Shift + Click but instead of just opening the new Instance of program, it opens the program in Administrator Mode.

Ctrl + Click

This is very handy if you have multiple instances of the same program running. You can easily toggle between open instances of a program using this combination.

Shift + Right Click

This combination shows the context menu that usually appears when you click an icon in explorer. The context menu shows commands such as Open, Open with.. and so on.

But if you do not like the new Taskbar (even with all those perks) and want to use the old one, we have just the thing for you.

Get Windows Vista Taskbar back

Right-click on the Taskbar and choose the properties dialog. Select the “small icons” checkbox and under the “Taskbar buttons” setting, choose “combine when taskbar is full“. You’ll have the same looks as with Windows Vista

Get Quick Launch toolbar back on TaskBar

Right-click the Taskbar, choose Toolbars >> New Toolbar
In the folder selection dialog, enter %userprofile%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Quick Launch and hit OK
Turn off the “lock the Taskbar” setting by right clicking on Taskbar and selecting “lock the Taskbar“.
Right-click on the divider and make sure that “Show text” and “Show title” are disabled and the view is set to “small icons“.
Use the dividers to rearrange the toolbar ordering to choice, and then lock the Taskbar again.

Old Behavior of Windows Live Messenger (MSN Messenger)

A lot of people enjoy new behavior of MSN Messenger in the Windows 7 Taskbar but if you don’t and want it to work the same as in older versions of Windows then

Navigate to C:\Program Files\Windows Live\Messenger\ and set the properties of msnmsgr.exe to Vista compatibility mode. This will place the Messenger icon back in your system tray and remove the 2 annoying tabs on the taskbar.

We hope that you will like these tricks. Do let us know in comments.

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