TaskSwitchXP

Screen shot © 2006 NTWind Software

TaskSwitchXP is a program that replaces the default Windows Alt-Tab task switcher. It improves upon the Windows version by showing a picture of each open window instead of just an icon.

This can be very helpful when you have several windows open for the same program (your web browser, for example) because you can easily see which window is which. That may not sound important until you try to alt-tab your way out of a porn site at work and end up at... another porn site. If only you could have seen where you were switching, you might still have a job.

allSnap

If you're as messy as me, you probably have windows cluttered all over your screen. And if you're as anal as me, you probably hate to see even one pixel go to waste. allSnap is a useful little program that will make your windows "snap" together very easily.

The author's webpage mentions that it uses a techinque called "hooking" to make the windows snap, and that supposedly this is supposed to be a bad thing. I personally have been using allSnap for probably over a year, and I've never seen it cause any problems.

Yahoo! Widget Engine

Yesterday we got you organized... so today we'll clutter your desktop. Yahoo! Widgets (formerly known as Konfabulator) lets you put all kinds of things directly on your desktop, from RSS/Atom news feeds (shown here), to the weather, to system meters, to various cartoon characters that say things when you click on them. Ever since Yahoo changed it from Konfabulator to Yahoo Widget Engine, they've been putting out craploads of Yahoo-integrated widgets (day planner, mail, notepad, etc.). I like to use the Day Planner widget at work so that I can see my Outlook calendar events for the day, as well as my to-do list.

If for some reason you're anti-Yahoo, or you just want to see what alternatives are out there, here are a couple others:

• Google Desktop added support for dragging panels off the sidebar and onto your desktop in version 3. It's free, and also has powerful desktop search capabilities.
• Stardock DesktopX is not free, and I've never used it myself, but my co-worker claims that this was the one that started it all.

- Kornhornio

Free Launch Bar

Screen shot © 2001-2005 TORDEX

I had a hard time deciding which program to start with for the first post, so I decided to give you one that will help you keep the rest organized.

Have you ever wished you could fit more on the Windows quick launch bar without having to take up a bunch of space? Well, the way to do that is to add menus to it.

Bob: "But Kornhornio, I have a menu. It's called the Start Menu. Why are you showing me this?"
Kornhornio: "Because you came to me , remember?"
Bob: "....... Sorry."

The Start Menu was a great idea, and it's still better than those old Program Groups it replaced from Windows 3.1 <shudder>. But these days it seems like every program that gets installed wants to put 50 shortcuts in there, and before you know it you can't find anything anymore. And would it be too much to ask that the Start Menu actually stay in alphabetical order? I don't think so.

Free Launch Bar can solve these problems. It takes your existing Quick Launch shortcuts as a starting point, but you can add menus to it, and it's easy to set those menus to auto-sort alphabetically (right-click inside a menu, Arrange Icons By, Auto Arrange). I personally like to keep my most-used programs right on the main bar, my not-quite-as-used programs under a few menus (apps, games, etc), and crap I hardly ever use buried somewhere in the Start Menu.

- Kornhornio

What the hell is this blog about?

For several years now, I've been running a personal website called KoRnhornio's Kreations. I'm a computer programmer, and I set up that site so that I would have a place to show the world my programs. They weren't anything special; just little projects I worked on in my spare time. As time went on, I discovered that while I love to work with computers and write programs, I just don't have that many good ideas for new programs.

But other people do. And a lot of them have great ideas. So since I don't have a lot of original "Kreations" to share anymore, I thought maybe I should start sharing my discoveries instead. I may post a program of my own from time to time, but for the most part this blog is about cool little programs and utilities I've found. Most of them are free or open source programs. These are programs I use on my own computers, and they work well for me, but don't blame me if your computer ends up opening a hole in the Earth.

- Kornhornio