Launching your favorite applications with the [Windows] key

Windows Vista provides you with shortcut to quickly access your favorite applications--you can assign them to special [Windows] key combinations.

To take advantage of this hidden trick, all you have to do is add the shortcuts to your favorite applications to the Quick Launch toolbar, which you can do with a simple drag and drop operation. You can have up to 10 shortcuts on the Quick Launch toolbar to use with the [Windows] key. By default, the Show Desktop and the Switch Between Windows/Flip 3D shortcuts are already on the Quick Launch toolbar, so with the idea that you'd leave them there, you can add up to 8 additional shortcuts.

Moving left to right, the first shortcut on the Quick Launch toolbar is automatically assigned to [Windows]+1, the second shortcut to [Windows]+2 and so on. The tenth shortcut on the Quick Launch toolbar is automatically assigned to [Windows]+0. By unlocking the Taskbar (via a simple right-click on the Taskbar and clicking Lock the Taskbar) and expanding the Quick Launch toolbar, as shown in Figure A, you can use drag and drop to arrange the shortcuts in any order that you want.

Once you memorize which numeric [Windows] keys are assigned to which application shortcuts; you can resize the Quick Launch toolbar to its default size and relock the Taskbar, as shown in Figure B. This lets you use the all the space on the Taskbar as you normally would and still be able to launch any of your applications with a simple [Windows] keystroke.

Other Win Key combinations

Here are a couple of other handy [Windows] key shortcuts:

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[Windows]+T: Cycles through programs using the Live Taskbar feature.

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[Windows]+[Spacebar]: Brings the Windows Sidebar to the foreground.

Using the mouse wheel to change the icon views

If you're using Windows Explorer to work with your files and folders, you've probably already discovered the new Views menu. You just click the arrow next to the Views icon on the toolbar to bring up the Views menu, as shown in Figure C, and then drag the slider up or down to change the size and appearance of the file and folder icons. t