Display Properties - The [Desktop] Tab

Remember the quote from the last section by Microsoft? “A theme is a background plus a set of sounds, icons, and other elements to help you personalize your computer with one click.”

Themes and their modifications, as we saw in the previous section, are built from a number of different components. This section focuses on the [Desktop] tab which contains a number of those component parts. Whether or not your intention is to design a new theme, in essence you are doing just that when you make the first change to the interface. Whether you save the theme with a snappy, personalized name or just let it use the [Old Theme Name (Modified)] format, this section we are about to explore is one of the building blocks for theme creation. Use one of the methods discussed earlier to open [Display Properties] and place the focus on the [Desktop] tab. (Fig. UI-15)

As you can see from the screenshot, the primary focus of the [Desktop] tab is the possible backgrounds that can be used in XP. Scroll through the list and click on each one to see a preview in the monitor display. The icon to the left of each image name indicates the image format. Assuming that XP was installed to C:\Windows, the bitmap (.bmp) images will be located in C:\Windows while the JPEG (.jpg) images are located in C:\WINDOWS\Web\Wallpaper. The supplied images may get you off to a good start but you certainly aren’t limited to those selections. Any image with a .bmp, .gif, .jpeg, .jpg, .dib, .png, .htm, or .html extension can be used as a background.

The [Browse] button is used to select additional images. Click [Browse] to open the window as shown in Fig. UI-16. Notice that the [Browse] window opens to the [My Pictures] folder by default, but you can select any drive, folder or network resource to search for images. The default search criteria is set to only search for Background Files. Click on the drop down selection box for [Files of Type:] as shown in Fig. UI-17 and select either [All Picture Files] or [HTML Documents] as the search criteria.

Fig. UI-16	Fig. UI-17

The [Position] button (Fig. UI-15) is composed of three settings which facilitate positioning of the selected image and how it displays on the desktop. Select one of the background images from the list and click [Position] to display the following choices.

[Center] places the selected image directly in the middle of the screen. How much desktop area is covered is dependent on the size of the original image. No adjustment is made to the original image dimensions.
[Tile] creates a repeating pattern of the image until the entire desktop surface is covered. Images which are geometric or have a regular repeating pattern work best when tiled, eliminating the severe breaks that will be evident where the images abut each other. Again, no adjustment is made to the original image dimensions.
[Stretch] expands the selected image both horizontally and vertically until the desktop surface is covered. The size and orientation of the original image play a large role in how the finished desktop appears. Try and select an image which is sized width and height proportional to the desktop for best results.

The [Color] button opens a selection screen to a number of color presets or the ability to use any custom color. The only limitation imposed is the graphics color quality setting governing the system. The desktop color can be set and used in conjunction with the [Center] command for an image to have the desktop color frame the image.

To get a good feel for the way pattern and image size interacts with the different controls, select a number of default images and view them using the [Center] [Tile] and [Stretch] controls. Pay particular attention to the types of patterns that work well with the different controls, resulting in minimal distortion and a pleasing overall visual effect.

The [Customize Desktop...] button is tucked away down at the lower left corner of this [Display Properties] tab. Judging from the amount of mail I’ve received here, and questions from the support and consulting work, this control should have been a bit more visible. It seems it is quite easily overlooked yet it leads to a number of frequently requested user options. Click [Customize Desktop...] (Fig. UI-18) and the [Desktop Items] Property Sheet (Fig. UI-19) focused on the [General] tab will open.

Fig. UI-18	Fig. UI-19

    The [Desktop Icons] section is the first category of offerings. Users of previous Windows versions may find it a bit strange that XP installs with only the Recycle Bin icon on the default desktop. Some users find the ‘clean’ desktop appearance appealing, preferring to navigate to needed files and folders via alternative methods. But if you’re one who likes the folders and shortcuts you’ve been accustomed to close at hand, place a checkmark next to the items you want restored to the desktop.
    The [Change Icon...] button makes it a simple task to assign a new icon to the desktop elements selected previously. Click on whatever item you wish to change followed by clicking the [Change Icon...] button. The [Change Icon] Property Sheet (Fig. UI-20) will open. There is a display of icons you may use as a replacement for the one you selected previously by clicking on it and selecting [OK]. If none of the available choices thrill you, specify a different search path in the [Look for Icons in this File:] box at the top of the window. If you did a default setting XP installation, %SystemRoot%\system32\shell32.dll entered in the field will provide a rich source of icons. For a trip down memory lane to icons you may have forgotten ever existed, try C:\WINDOWS\system32\moricons.dll.

    The [Restore Default] button does exactly what you would expect. If you don’t like the change you made, click [Restore Default] and you’re back to the default XP icon.
    The [Desktop Cleanup] area is the final selection on this screen. If housekeeping isn’t your forte, you might find this useful. XP includes the Desktop Cleanup Wizard. The wizard scans your desktop for shortcuts which have not been used and moves them to the [Unused Desktop Shortcuts] folder it creates on your desktop. It’s important to note that this only applies to shortcuts, not to folders or other items. The wizard gives you the option to keep or move the shortcuts before any changes are implemented. Figures UI 21-25 illustrate the Desktop Cleanup Wizard and the resulting folder.

Fig. UI-21	Fig. UI-22	Fig. UI-23	Fig. UI-24	Fig. UI-25

Return to the [Desktop Items] Property Sheet and change the focus of the tab to [Web] (Fig. UI-26). Many people find it convenient to have web content available on the desktop. News, investment, weather, or your normal home page are all good candidates for Active Desktop content.

The [New] button opens the [New Desktop Item] (Fig. UI-27) screen. Here you can either click the [Gallery] button to open a Microsoft website where Active Desktop content can be downloaded or use the [Location] area to type in the URL of the website. If you don’t know the URL, use the [Browse] button which will open to your Favorites menu (Fig. UI-28) where you can select the site you want. The URL will be entered into the [Location] (Fig. UI-29) area automatically. Click the [Finish] button and the [Add Item to Active Desktop (TM)] confirmation window (Fig. UI-30) will open. Select [OK] to verify the site selection or click [Customize...] to enter the [Offline Favorite Wizard] that allows some quick settings relating to management of the offline content.

Fig. UI-27	Fig. UI-28	Fig. UI-29	Fig. UI-30

The [Offline Favorite Wizard] screens are shown below in Figs. UI 31-34. Since the same options are available in more detail from the [Desktop Items] property sheet under the [Web] tab they will be covered there. Take a look at the screenshots just to familiarize yourself with them.

Fig. UI-31	Fig. UI-32	Fig. UI-33	Fig. UI-34

Now that some Active Desktop content has been added, return to the [Web] tab under [Desktop Items] and you’ll see something similar to Fig. UI-35. For this discussion I’ve checked the box for [The Elder Geek] to add it to the desktop. Highlight one of the URL’s in the web page section and the [Delete] [Properties] and [Synchronize] buttons become active.

[Delete] - Highlight the site, click the button, confirm and poof. It’s gone.

[Synchronize] - Highlight the site and click. Desktop web content is immediately refreshed.

[Properties] - Highlight the site of choice and click the [Properties] button. The dialog box shown in Fig. UI-36 will open with the the focus on the [Web Document] tab. Notice the naming convention used for this property sheet. It will show the URL followed by the word Properties. The Property Sheet will contain three tabs: [Web Document] [Schedule] and [Download].

[Web Document] (Fig. UI-36) contains the basic information about the site you have chosen as it relates to this computer. The site URL, the number of times this computer has accessed the site and some general summary information are included. The one user defined option on this page is [Make This Site Available Offline]. Leave this box checked and the site content will be dynamically updated without user intervention according to the schedule created in the [Schedule] and [Download] options. Uncheck the box and the [Schedule] and [Download] tabs will disappear since there will be no offline content updates.

[Download] (Fig. UI-37) configures the amount of content that is made available offline from the Active Desktop site. The [Content to Download] section specifies how far down in the link structure below the home page you wish to download, whether you want to download external links and how much total disk space will be allocated to offline content. If you want to be notified when the site content changes, fill in the e-mail and server names in the [When this page changes, send e-mail to:] section after checking the box. The final section allows you to enter site login information by clicking the [Login] (Fig. UI-38) button if the site requires a username and password.

Fig. UI-37	Fig. UI-38

[Schedule] (Fig. UI-39) sets the ‘how and when’ for synchronizing desktop items. If you want to synchronize your content manually, select the top radio button [Only when I choose Synchronize from the Tools menu]. To set a defined schedule for synchronization select the lower radio button [Using the Following Schedule(s)]. There can be more than one schedule to correspond to different active desktop content.

Fig. UI-39

[Add...] - To create a new schedule, click the [Add...] button to open the [New Schedule] (Fig. UI-40) Property Sheet. Set the time and frequency options and assign the schedule a name. If you have multiple sites and schedules, assign the schedule the same name as the site for easier reference. The check box at the bottom allows you to automatically connect to the internet for the scheduled update. Click [OK] and you’ll be returned to the [Schedule] tab.

Fig. UI-40

[Remove] - Select and highlight a schedule. Click [Delete] and it’s gone.
[Edit...] - This is one of the places where the design of a user interface can drive you nuts. Common sense would dictate that this button would take you back to edit the screen that was accessed when the [Add] button was pressed and you set the update time and frequency options, but it doesn’t. While it does allow editing of a selected schedule, it does it in much greater detail via a series of four tabs

[General] (Fig. UI-41) - Tells you the name of the schedule, when it is scheduled to synchronize content, when it last synchronized the content and when the next synchronization is scheduled to occur.

Fig. UI-41

[Synchronization Items] (Fig. UI-42) - The first option is choose a network connection method via the dropdown box. The second option is to select what content you want to synchronize and the third option is to allow automatic network connections if not already connected at the scheduled time of synchronization.

Fig. UI-42

[Schedule] (Fig. UI-43) - The first thing you want to do on this tab, before setting a schedule, is go to the bottom of the property sheet and check [Show Multiple Schedules] if you have more than one schedule. This places all the schedules into a drop down box at the top of the sheet. In addition, it makes a [New] and [Delete] buttons appear so you can delete obsolete schedules or create a new schedule. Use the [Schedule Task] (Fig. UI-44) [Start Time] and [Schedule Task Daily] boxes to enter your preferred settings. The [Advanced...] (Fig. UI-45) button allows you to further refine the update schedule. By carefully manipulating the dates and frequency on this screen you can have minute by minute updates if the kind of content you use requires this frequency level.
[Settings] (Fig. UI-46) - This final tab allows further refinement to task completion, idle time and whether or not the tasks should be run if the computer switches to battery power.

Fig. UI-43	Fig. UI-44	Fig. UI-45	Fig. UI-46

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