When installing new software, you often have the option of choosing where you want to place “shortcuts” to it.  There are basically three places:

·         The START menu (conventionally, all programs are shown here)

·         The desktop

·         The Quick Launch bar

We often see the desktop of many of our clients’ computers completely covered in icons, and often they do not understand why they are there or what to do with them. 

An icon, whether on the desktop or in the Quick Launch bar, is just a shortcut to the program itself and deleting it will NOT delete the program.  So, where should you place icons or “shortcuts”?  This of course is purely personal choice, but if you are not disciplined, then your computer can become untidy.

You can place icons pointing to frequently-used programs on the Desktop yourself if you wish to have quick access to them without going through the START menu.  Whether you do, is purely a matter of personal choice and convenience.

A quick way of placing an icon on the desktop is to go to the START menu, select the program concerned and right-click on it.  This will produce a menu of options, one of which is SEND TO.  Click on this and select DESKTOP (Create shortcut).  You will now have a shortcut to the program on your desktop.

Similarly, shortcuts to programs can be placed on the Quick Launch bar.  This is an area on the Task bar immediately to the right of the START button, (usually on the bottom of the Windows screen) – see below:

If this bar is not visible, then you can make it so by right-clicking on the Taskbar.  Make sure there is no check mark against LOCK THE TASKBAR, then select TOOLBARS and check the QUICK LAUNCH item.

To place a program icon here, you can drag an existing icon from the desktop and drop it on the Quick Launch bar.  Alternatively, you need to go to MY COMPUTER and find the program itself under the application folder under the PROGRAM FILES folder. 

The program file is usually the one with a .exe extension or with the main program icon adjacent to it in the list of files in the application folder.  Click on the program file and drag it onto the Quick Launch bar.  This will create an icon and it will now appear on the bar.

NB: The Quick Launch bar does not automatically re-size when you add icons.  You can manually make it longer by dragging the divider to the right.