WinXP toolbar replacement/modification tool needed
Friday, September 3, 2010 by kaylord | Discussion: Customization Software
Hi all and grats for the forum, I'm a newbie here (this is my first post 
) and like to ask your for an help.
Shortly; I'm working on an XP machine and my taskbar is always full of task, mostly related to different windows of the same application (in example, many modes of a SAP GUI, since I'm an abap developer); as a consequence, it is sometimes boring finding the proper task in a taskbar full of buttons which appears identical (ALT+TAB is a solution, but it's quite time-expensive 
).
What I'd really love to have is a way to identify inactive tasks on the XP taskbar; the optimal solution would be a mod that allows me to rename labels @runtime of the task buttons in taskbar, or color them. These are functions I usually use for example for the tabs in Firefox, when things are getting crowded
I'm quite used to the standard XP taskbar, so an utility that could do this would be appreciated; unfortunately, I waste a lot of time looking for something like that without success. So, a taskbar replacement which includes these features would be a solution, too.
Thanks in advance for your help and suggestions 
Reply #2 Friday, September 3, 2010 7:59 AM
Thank you LightStar for your quick reply,
unfortunately I'm stuck on Windows XP for compatibility issues, at least until some of the tools I use for work purpose will be upgraded.
Thanks again waiting for other purposes or suggestions
Reply #3 Friday, September 3, 2010 6:13 PM
I had a similar issue and am on xp, you can give this a try:
http://www.crystalxp.net/galerie/en.id.12889-visual-task-tips-kevin_tux-explorer-tools.htm
I find it very useful. My box looks and acts as if it was on 7.
Reply #4 Friday, September 3, 2010 6:30 PM
hello w4xpl4y3r,
tried it, but ... I'm not able to rename task names into my taskbar's buttons, or I'm not able to run it properly. Maybe because I already use a thumb utility to manage alt+tab... Anyway, not properly the purpose I was looking for, which is: rename task buttons labels in taskbar.
Thanks anyway for your help
Reply #6 Tuesday, September 7, 2010 10:07 AM
Thanks Lantec, I'll give Winstep a try since there's a demo for evaluation purpose of 30 days. Anything similar (also, simpler) but free or opensource?
Thanks again
Reply #7 Sunday, October 3, 2010 11:09 PM
Don't shoot the pianist... But, doesn''t xp offer you to group similar windows (so you just couldn't have a taskbar cluttered by handfull of windows) ??
Reply #8 Monday, October 4, 2010 11:42 AM
Hi olivia,
that grouping function clutters all the similar windows; so if I'm running a client application which opens a window for each server system I want to connect to, that function will group all the instances in a single group.
Let's complicate the game; each server system I'm connected to opens two or more windows ... Now, a labeling system would help recognizing immediately the correct instance on the system bar.
That grouping function instead will instead force me to find a single task between the jungle in which many tasks have the same name...
Still looking for something like that
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Reply #1 Friday, September 3, 2010 7:17 AM
Not sure how to do that for you kaylord, but you might investigate upgrading to Windows 7, it has that feature built in (with images even).