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Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Stupid Windows 7 trick: get a functional recycle bin icon on your taskbar

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For a while now, I've been hiding my desktop icons and using a taskbar toolbar instead. It's a lot tidier, and one somewhat useful benefit is having the recycle bin always close at hand -- without having to windows + D.

The only downside to using the desktop as a taskbar toolbar is that the recycle bin won't move in front of Libraries or your user folder. If you want the bin in full view, you're stuck displaying at least three icons -- two of which you don't need if you already have Explorer pinned.

TechSpot's Matthew DeCarlo points out that if you use the QuickLaunch (or any custom folder of your choosing), you can simply drag the recycle bin icon off your desktop, onto the toolbar, and ba-da-bing, you've got a functioning bin like the one in my screenshot.

Here's the short and sweet way to pull this off:
  1. Right click in some empty space on your taskbar and choose toolbars -> new toolbar from the menu
  2. Paste %userprofile%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Quick Launch into the "folder" box and click select folder.
  3. Drag the recycle bin icon from your desktop onto the newly-created toolbar.
  4. Position the bin icon so it's first in line.
You're done! All that's left to do is to grab the slider and place the toolbar where you want it, and shut off the title and text labels if you want a seamless look. To do that, right-click the slider and untick show title and show text.

One note: this doesn't look all that hot if you have a vertical taskbar since the toolbar icons are left justified while your taskbar icons are centered.

Thanks, Julio!

Stupid Windows 7 trick: get a functional recycle bin icon on your taskbar originally appeared on Download Squad on Tue, 15 Sep 2009 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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