Want easy access to programs but hate rummaging through the Start Menu’s All Programs list? Don’t like keyboard launchers such as Launchy? One overlooked feature of Windows is the ability to create custom toolbars on the taskbar based by folder. This article will show you how to get started.
(About the picture: Don’t confuse the Start Menu icon (Windows flag) with the actual toolbar (button that has the word “Start” on it).)
We’re going to make our to-be start menu, and I’m going to base mine off Ubuntu’s Application menu. Make a new folder somewhere (I made mine in My Documents and named it Start) and fill it with your categorizations (I chose Games, Multimedia, Office, Web, Administration, and Accessories). This is all to your tastes, so do whatever you want.
Right click on any portion of the taskbar (that’s the bar where your start button is), highlight Toolbars, and click New Toolbar…
![Create a Toolbar using \](http://thirderror.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/07/make_toolbar_from_start.png "Create a Toolbar using \")
A New Toolbar dialog will popup, asking you which folder to make your toolbar from. Locate the folder you made in Preparation, and click it, then click OK.
A Start Menu is a useless menu without references to actual programs/files in it, so we’re going to add some shortcuts to the programs we want.
Find programs you want by going through your All Programs list. I picked Windows Movie Maker for this example, so right click and Copy.
Since it belongs in my categorization of Multimedia (makes videos), I went into my Start folder, then Multimedia, and pasted it in. Repeat this for all of your programs, and soon you should have a Start menu replacement.
Great tip! I do this on my desktop with the QuickLaunch toolbar. If you want to, you can change the icons for the shortcuts in the toolbar by right-clicking, selecting “Properties” and clicking “Change Icon” (Windows 2000)