how to pin show desktop to the taskbar in windows 7 ?

It has come to my attention that there are many folk who wish to to be able to pin the desktop to the task bar to the left of there computer using windows 7 ?
For those of you who wish to do this there is a small utility available for you to do so.
As it stands at the moment the show /peek at the desktop is to the far right of the computer
As i say this unity will position back to the left hand side of your computer just like as in xp/vista
There are many tutorials going around on how to achieve this manually with various degree's of success and having evaluated on what's happening in many forums i felt it was time to put everyone out of there misery and post this link
enjoy

Green Point Software UK Ltd - Home of CD Box Labeler Pro and Image Converter Pro

I am aware of a tutorial on this subject but feel there may be some struggling so if anyone else gets stuck we have the link here

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/26379-show-desktop-icon-taskbar.html

Thanks for the tip Nick...

Great Find. +rep.

Nice tip Nick, thanks

Nice little application, Thanks. Think this should had been posted under "Customization."

Also, "Welcome to the Seven Forums."

your very welcome guys and nice to be here

additional help needed

I am helping someone with Windows 7, although I use Windows XP 2002 SP3. On my computer, I've pinned "show desktop" icon to my task bar, which helps as provide instant privacy. No matter what I'm working on, I click the "show desktop" icon and all the person walking up sees is my desktop screen.

When I put the "show desktop" icon, following directions offered here (which were clear and correct and helpful!), clicking on the icon does NOT clear the screen and show the desktop.

Does anyone have advise as to what I can do to add this level of privacy on the Windows 7 machine?

Thank you.

Welcome to Seven Forums Borza. Would a keyboard shortcut be as fast?

Win key (the key with the windows flag)+D

Or, just click on the show desktop button in lower left



The program in the original post only moves it to the left.

A Guy

I realize this is a rather old topic, but I found two variations that are rather interesting.

Variation #1

1. Using a notepad or text editor, create a script file with this content:
[Shell]
Command=2
IconFile=explorer.exe,3
[Taskbar]
Command=ToggleDesktop

2. Save it and name as "Desktop.scf".

3. Create a blank text file, then rename it "showdesktop.exe".

4. Create a new folder, under "documents" and call it whatever you wish (e.g. "custom").

5. Put that "showdesktop.exe" and "Desktop.scf" files in the new folder.

5. Now on the bottom task bar, right mouse click and select "Toolbars", then "New toolbar", and select the folder you just made. Also select to "unlock" the task bar.

6. The content of that folder, "showdesktop.exe", will appear as an icon when you click the ">>" to open. Select its properties and then change it to "Desktop.scf", preserving the proper path to it.

7. For the properties of this toolbar, uncheck the Show Text and Show Title. The show desktop shortcut icon will show now by default.

8. You can move this toolbar to the left of the pinned task bar icons and you're done.


Variation #2

You can simply go and get the Quick Launch toolbar. It's on your system as it was on Vista, just tucked away out of sight.

1. Right click on the taskbar, select "Toolbars" and then "New Toolbar".

2. For the folder, refer to the following path:
C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Quick Launch. It will now appear on your task bar.

3. Right mouse click this new toolbar and uncheck "show text" and "show title".

4. You can now move this to the far left and you've got your Quick Launch back, complete with "Show Desktop" and "Switch between windows" shortcuts. You can customize it as you wish, of course. The only real drawback with the Quick Launch is that it doesn't highlight the shortcut when the application is active, as the pinned icons do.


While Microsoft introduced an interesting variation putting the Aero "show/peek desktop" button on the far right, it's idiotic that it wasn't put immediately to the left of the Start Menu, where your mouse cursor travels to most frequently. Tossing it to the far right means frequent left-right screen edge travel. Why make the user work harder? Nuts.

Also, the pinned task bar icons have too much space around them even when selected for the "small" size. The Quick Launch icons appear nicely compact. If the pinned icons appeared this way, there really wouldn't be a need to restore the Quick Launch.