This post is in response to Jeff Blankenburg’s post about the contents of his Quick Launch bar.
Nothing. Mine is turned off. Here’s what my start menu looks like though. I have turned off the display of my recently opened programs, and I dragged these shortcuts out there. (This is my work notebook.)
Internet Explorer 8 – I use it mainly to see what’s new in IE8 and when Firefox doesn’t render something correctly (hardly ever).
Firefox 3 – My primary web browser. The plug-in support is the difference-maker for me.
Outlook 2007 – Used for my work email. I also use the Outlook Connector to access one of my Hotmail accounts.
Windows Live Mail – I use this to access my other Hotmail account. I could put them both in Outlook, but I like to keep my hands in Live Mail too.
visionapp Remote Desktop 2008 – A fantastic remote desktop management tool with a very low price tag.
Visual Studio 2005 – Still some existing development work in VS2005.
Visual Studio 2008 – For all new development. Also, for playing around with new stuff out on CodePlex.
SQL Server Management Studio – ‘nuff said.
Visual SourceSafe – All of our old releases are still in VSS. -cringe-
Command Prompt – Launches as Administrator.
FileZilla – For all my FTP client needs, mostly for uploading files to my blog.
Windows Live Writer Beta – The best blogging client for Windows.
Word 2007 – Because it’s MS Word.
Paint.NET – My favorite image editing tool… and it’s free!
Zune – My current media player, but MediaMonkey is still the default on my home PC and my favorite.
Services – Because sometime you just have to stop some services.
Event Viewer – A developer’s friend.
Programs and Features – This is here because I’m always installing and uninstalling stuff from CodePlex and MS Downloads.
Windows Update – I want to be the first one to get my Windows Defender definition updates!
So, that’s my list. What’s in your Quick Launch bar and/or Start Menu and/or Launcher of choice?
I’ve pretty much ignored the Start Menu and Launcher since I discovered the best feature of Vista (or in my case 2008 server). Just hit the windows key and start typing! Windows key + F => Firefox, Windows key + V => visual studio, Windows key + S => SQL Management Studio.