Productivity: Windows Taskbar Launcher

Windows has one feature back from windows 98 that has been largely overlooked by a lot of people. The ability to use a taskbar to launch programs, webpages and directories, and without using any additional programs. This article will show you how to use that very feature, which is available even in xp and vista.

Step 1:
Right click on the taskbar, and in the toolbars menu, click on “Address”



Step 2:

That’s it. you’re done.

You can use this launcher for launching programs, webpages, folders, files, anything. it behaves as a run menu of sorts. The following commands are only a few among the ones that work

  • cmd
  • c:
  • dxdiag
  • msconfig
  • firefox
  • winword
  • powerpnt
  • and many more


This can be easily disabled and reneabled on the fly, and you can consider making your taskbar bigger to hold all the other tasks that you might be using. This feature saves a lot of time in the long run.

About Me: I’m Anirudh, a guest writer. I author similar articles regularly on PingPulse. I also work part time as a usability consultant.

This post was published by on April 29, 2007

About the Author: Thilak Rao works as a Social Media Expert. He is one of the first professional bloggers from India, and he loves to write, travel and click photos. Follow him on Twitter @thilak

  • http://anirudhsanjeev.org Anirudh

    oops. post slug came out wrong.

  • Life Balance

    Cool! Is there a quick way to set the focus and type to the Address dialog, especially when I have my toolbar set to “AutoHide”?

  • http://www.mikroproje.com zoid

    nice tip, i have been using this with my xp, and 2k3 system

  • http://sindhu-s.com sindhu

    nice enough. but i dont want my screen space being reduced with a double sized statusbar.thank you

  • Mosey

    Launchy does it as well :D

  • http://www.paidsurveys101.net John

    Seems like mini-commander clone to me ;)

  • Fuzzy

    Sindhu – U can also drag&drop any folder on the edge of the screen to create new taskbar. Then You can use this tip there and also have links to Your programs or sites on it. Enjoy… ;)

  • Fuzzy

    Ohh… I missunderstood… Anyway You can set new toolbar to autohide, or just let Your taskbar be single sized :) It will be workin’ …

  • http://www.listikal.com listikal

    Why when I type something into this address bar, does it just open up my browser?

  • Life Balance

    Cool! Is there a quick way to set the focus and type to the Address dialog, especially when I have my toolbar set to “AutoHide”?