Lifehacker has a recurring post, “What’s on your Desktop,” that is always fun and informative. It is here you can find creative and interesting uses of desktop real estate. Many of you certainly use some nifty tools on your computer desktops. So, let’s see what you’ve got. Let’s share!
Take a screen shot of your desktop, then tell us what you do with the information you find there. Maybe you are using something that the rest of us can steal borrow use, too.
We’ll start with my desktop. I use a double-monitor setup so my screen shot captures both screens. The images are photos I took of the changing weather in South Texas a few weeks ago. One night, the sunset was beautiful and red. The next morning, the fog was so thick you couldn’t see very far. I like the images; that’s the only reason they are there.
The rest of the desktop real estate is kept relatively clear. I don’t like clutter and it’s hard for me to concentrate when things (applications, files, etc.) aren’t put in their proper places. I actually have a folder on the desktop called “desktop clutter.” Random stuff Important files go in there until I have a chance to put them on an external drive. The other folders on the desktop are current writing projects, my dropbox folder, and the recycle bin.
Additionally, I use Object Dock to keep my desktop clear of program shortcuts. Object Dock allows for the Mac-looking row at the top of the screen that contains my most frequently used programs. This is a wonderfully easy program to use, it can be adapted for personal preferences, and it’s cost effective ( $0 to $60 depending on what you want it to do and the services you include).
Here are two screen shots of the Object Dock.
Another program that you can find on (or in) my system is UltraMon. This is a program that helps me control the appearance and functionality of the two monitors. I have yet to figure out the “separate screensavers” function, but that’s not a big issue for me. What this program does do– and I love it for this feature– is that it allows me to maximize windows across both desktops (a spreadsheet, for example). I can move one window to the other monitor with just one click of a mouse. While I have never had to use the mirror function, UltraMon does let you mirror the main monitor for use in presentations. UltraMon costs $39.95, but it’s been worth the money I spent on it three years ago.
There is a ProfHacker widget, but you won’t find it on my desktop. I am waiting for it to be available for the PC.
If you want to play along (and we hope you do!), please take a screen shot/capture of your desktop and upload it to the ProfHacker group on Flickr. Be sure and add notes to explain your widgets, photos, etc. We will have a followup post in a few weeks, and we’ll display what’s on YOUR desktop. In the meantime, please leave comments below.
[All images by Flickr user Billie Hara. Used under Creative Commons license.]
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7 Responses to What’s on your Desktop?
Amy Cavender - February 25, 2010 at 3:28 pm
I’ve uploaded a screenshot of my desktop to the ProfHacker group.
Amy Cavender - February 25, 2010 at 3:31 pm
Um, let’s try that link again. This one should work better.
Rana - February 25, 2010 at 3:38 pm
Heh. Under normal use, I never see my desktop. I have the Dock along the right edge of the screen, and the menus along the top, and that’s all that’s visible. Normally I have about 8-10 programs active at once, each with multiple windows, and so I use Mac’s Spaces and the control-tab and control-~ commands to flip through the windows and programs when I need to shift. I still need to figure out a tidy way to flip through tabs in Firefox, but I love that I can just jump around with just a keystroke.
Amy Cavender - February 25, 2010 at 3:54 pm
I suppose I should say a little about the desktop: I’m a neatnik, so I prefer to keep nothing on the desktop. The dock is set to auto-hide, and I keep only necessary items and things I can’t turn off in the menu bar. I use QuickSilver to launch programs and Spotlight to find needed items.
Derek Bruff - February 25, 2010 at 10:59 pm
I use John’s Background Switcher to keep my desktop background interesting. The program rotates my background every 10 minutes (an adjustable time interval), and it can pull randomly selected photos from a variety of sites and feeds online. I’ve got mine to pull the top 100 photos from the Flickr groups “architecture” and “landscape-dream,” both full of beautiful photos.
The program makes it very easy to save a photo you like for later use. I’ve been collecting photos I particularly like from those two Flickr groups for several months now in a folder on my laptop. I’ve got JBS set up to show a random photo from that folder about a third of the time. So I get a great mix of “old favorites” as well as the latest and greatest from Flickr.
Brian Croxall - February 26, 2010 at 10:53 am
My desktop isn’t all that interesting, but I will say that I’ve itching to find some spare time to follow these directions to get my iCal events displayed on my desktop.
joanna - February 26, 2010 at 3:31 pm
Here’s what I want for my desktop: the ability to save one document to several programs (i.e. Box.net, MSWord, Googledocs) at once. Does such a widget exist?