GET RID OF THE ARROWS ON ICONS— AND DO LOTS MORE
Those little arrows that appear on desktop icons really bug me. Is there some way to get rid of them

There is, but in answering your question I have the opportunity to introduce a very handy Windows tool, Tweak UI. If you haven’t heard of Tweak, you’re missing out on one of Microsoft’s hidden gifts. And it really is a gift—it’s free.

Tweak gives you access to Windows system settings that you can’t otherwise access, including adjusting the functions that control, among other things, your mouse, Windows Explorer and the taskbar. The list of Windows adjustments you can make with Tweak is so long it would take up the whole column.

Rather than publishing the long URL and having you type the whole thing, you can get to the Tweak site by doing an Internet search for Tweak UI. When you get there, you’ll discover that Tweak is part of Microsoft’s PowerToy collection—a toolbox of even more really neat and useful functions; they, too, are all free. They include a tool that sharpens the images on your screen (ClearType Tuner), a slide-show generator (HTML Slide Show Wizard) and one of my favorites, an Alt-Tab Replacement that, in addition to displaying the icon of the application window you are switching to, also shows you a preview of the page—a great help when you’re working on multiple sessions of an application (see screenshot below).

There are Tweak versions even for old editions of Windows. However, Microsoft has yet to issue a Tweak UI for Vista, although if you do an Internet search for Tweak UI for Vista, you’ll see that several vendors are offering versions they’ve created—for a fee.

Oh, yes, you wanted to get rid of those little arrows.

Before	After

After you download and install Tweak, click on the + sign next to Explorer to open more categories, and then click on Shortcut and make your selection under Shortcut overlay (see screenshot below):

Have fun examining Tweak’s many options.

COME TO TERMS WITH THE MY DOCUMENTS FOLDER
My computer tries to get me to put all my working files under one subdirectory, and that’s the My Documents folder. Somehow that doesn’t seem right to me. Instead, I set up my computer so that my working files are listed directly under my C:\. So, for example, I organize clients files like this: C:\Clients. Likewise, I organize my personnel file like this: C:\Personnel. But I pay a price for bypassing My Documents because it’s the default starting point for the Open and Save As dialog boxes. Your thoughts?

Ah, the My Documents folder dilemma! My Documents was created in the early days of Windows, and we’ve been saddled with it ever since. The thought behind it was valid: One default place to store documents so they’ll be easy to find. Unfortunately, it was not well thought through because, for one thing, My Documents was not that easy to find unless you created a shortcut to it. For years, I, too, refused to use it—pretty much following the same folder lineup that you use—directly under C:\.

However, I finally got tired of having to overcome the default setup, and I switched and discovered it really wasn’t so bad—even though it makes for a really long file name. In Windows XP, for example, it looks like this: C:\Documents and Settings\<username>\My Documents…and only then can you see the actual file name.

By the way, if you don’t like the name My Documents, go right into the address line in Windows Explorer and change it (see screenshot below).

Also, if you have a neat little program called Tweak UI (see column item “Get rid of the arrows on icons—and do lots more”), you can make the My Documents icon the first icon on the desktop.

MAKE THE SIZE OF OUTLOOK CALENDAR’S WEEKENDS EQUAL WEEKDAYS
I have an active life in addition to my professional hours from Monday to Friday. So it annoys me that the Outlook calendar shows Saturdays and Sundays squeezed down into half-size boxes. How can I overcome this oversight?

It’s not quite an oversight—it’s just the default Outlook view, which apparently satisfies many users. However, you can easily change it. Right-click in any blank area of the calendar grid and then click on Other Settings on the shortcut menu to bring up this screen.

Remove the check next to Compress weekend days and then click on OK and you can have it your way.

Since you’re concerned about the smaller Saturday-Sunday boxes, you also may appreciate knowing that you don’t have to have Saturday on the extreme left of the page and Sunday on the other end. You can have them sitting side by side. To do that, go to Tools, Options, Calendar Options, Calendar work week (see screenshot below) and make Monday, rather than Sunday, the First day of week.

So it will look like this:

AUTOMATE THE OPENING OF A GROUP OF EXCEL WORKSHEETS
I usually work with as many as seven Excel workbooks at one time. Opening them all is a chore because I have to first locate them and then click on each, one at a time, wait for them to open and then go through the whole process again. There has to be an easier way. Help!

There is, but first you must be sure your computer is programmed so that when you click on File, Open (Ctrl+O) you will be taken directly to that folder, which contains all your working files. To program the default, launch Excel and then click on Tools, Options, General and enter your folder of choice next to Default file location and click on OK (see screenshot). Or you could simply add that address in the box labeled At startup, open all files in.

Now to the shortcut. After typing Ctrl+O to open to the default folder, don’t just click on the first file you want; instead, hold down the Ctrl key and click on each target file in the order you want it to open. If you accidentally click on a file you don’t want, revoke the highlighting by clicking on it again. Then, after making your selections, click on File, Open and each file will open in the order you initially highlighted it.

The trick works in other Office applications as well. But to set the default file location in Word click on Tools, Options, File Locations (see screenshot below).

OOPS! I LOST MY VISTA’S SHOW DESKTOP ICON. HELP TO GET IT BACK
While I was maneuvering around my new Vista computer, I accidentally lost my Show Desktop icon. Since I rely on it, I feel quite lost without it. Can you help?

Join the club. I lost it, too. But I got it back after I hastily did an Internet search and found a Web site that gives instructions for getting it back. The URL is www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vista/quick-help-restore-show-desktop-icon-in-windows-vista/. At the site you’ll find a Zip file you can download. Once it’s loaded, open Windows Explorer and type the following into the address bar: shell:Quick Launch (see screenshot below).

Then unzip the file and copy it into the folder. That will return the icon to its rightful place.

HOW TO CREATE A HANDS-OFF SECTION OF A SPREADSHEET
I often distribute complex spreadsheets so colleagues can enter their own information. But I don’t want them to access any of the other parts of the document. How can I create a hands-off section?

One of the easiest ways is to use the Visual for Basic Applications (VBA) editor. Now don’t get nervous; it’s not really high tech and it’s easy to implement. Begin by right-clicking on the sheet tab of the worksheet to which you want to add protection; in the screenshot below, that’s Sheet1. When the context menu opens, click on View Code.

That, in turn, will open the Properties-Sheet1 code window (see screenshot below). If the Properties window fails to open, press F4.

In the box next to ScrollArea, enter the range of the area you want available for data entry; in this case I made it $A$1:$C$7. It must be a contiguous area. The rest of the worksheet is now cordoned off.

Finally, close the VBA editor and the worksheet is ready to go.

CELL PHONES AND HOTEL MAGNETIC KEY CARDS DON’T MIX
The desk clerk at the hotel I was staying in told me that the reason my room key card kept failing was because I kept it in my pocket next to my cell phone. Sure enough, after the clerk reactivated the card and I kept it in a separate pocket, the problem didn’t reoccur. Is that explanation an urban myth? What’s the story?

I’ve had the same experience, and when I checked with a manager with my cell phone company, she told me it does happen from time to time—especially with phones that have a metal, rather than a plastic, case.

Stanley Zarowin is a contributing editor to the JofA. His e-mail address is stanley.joatech@gmail.com.