Side bar - right-hand side of screen

History

1936 saw an amazing English mathematician, Alan Turing, work on logic, algebra and number theory. He is thought of as being the father of theoretical computer science and artificial intelligence. By 1940, the Bombe - a machine for Enigma decryption - was Turing’s 'baby’.  This machine broke the U-boat Enigma machine’s complicated code and was instrumental in winning World War Two’s battle of the Atlantic.  By 1946, Turing had branched into computer and software design and led the world into a new era.

In the computing world of the 21st Century, experts in computer science, physics, and mathematics vie for a valuable award:  The Turing Award, named after this extraordinary Englishman. Sadly Turing committed suicide in 1954 by ingesting cyanide poisoning in Wilmslow, Cheshire.  Some could say that this was the price of genius as well as the hounding he suffered by the paparatzzi because of his homosexuality.

But how does the Vista Sidebar link to Turing? The Sidebar itself originated in a Microsoft Research project called Sideshow. Microsoft Research (MSR) is one of the top research centers in the world and is a division of Microsoft.  It was created in 1991 and enables enterprising programmers to research various computer science topics and issues. And amongst MSR's highly recognized expert employees are 2 Turing Award winners, Tony Hoare (or Sir Charles Antony Richard Hoare to us!) and Butler Lampson. They and others at MSR developed the Sidebar in the summer of 2000. It was initially used internally at Microsoft and included a clock, traffic reports, and Instant Messaging (IM) integration.

Functions

The aim of the Sidebar was originally to replace the Quick Launch Bar.  However, it now stands on its own and is as valuable to users as is the Quick Launch. The Sidebar can be accessed from the menu at the bottom righ-hand side of the desktop.  Hover over the icon to see it then left-click over the icon to call up the menu.

No sign of the Sidebar?

If you can’t find the Sidebar on the toolbar,  use one of the other new facilities:  the Search facility. Click the Start/Windows button and type into the Start Search box, “Windows Sidebar.”

The program will now appear at the top of the box.  Click on the Windows Sidebar icon and the Sidebar itself will pop up - generally on the right-hand side of your screen. You will see the default programs, all of which you can turn off by clicking on the X at the top right-hand side of the gadet. You have to click on the gadget and look very carefully to find this X. You can see it in the exaggerated image below:

Features

The Windows Vista Sidebar has features which can be modified, and its icons are generally linked directly to the Internet. These mini applications or gadgets can run on the Sidebar or can be dragged and dropped onto the desktop.

The Sidebar currently includes over a dozen gadgets including Calendar, Clock, Contacts, CPU Meter, Currency conversion, RSS Feed Headlines, Notes, Picture Puzzle, Slide Show, Stocks, and Weather. Three of these are displayed by default: the Clock, Slide Show and Feed Headlines.  The only problem with the Feed Headlines is that they are aimed at the American market and may not be of immediate interest to users in the UK.The picture sideshow runs in mini-form as part of the Sidebar and you can add your favourite pictures to this by saving them to the blue Virtual Pictures folder (more about Virtual folders later) in Vista Explorer.

The Gadgets keep you updated on services such as international exchange rates, stocks and shares, weather, news, traffic maps, Internet radio, and even online photo albums. They can integrate with other programs, for instance, a view of all your online instant messaging contacts. You also have games, calculators, sticky notes, calendars and clocks. You can check the time in the UK and have a second clock with the time of a different country.

To get the full potential from these Gadgets you should really be a Broadband rather than a Dial-up user as they are 'live' icons. They are best viewed if you have a wide screen as you can let the Sidebar dock at the side, top or bottom of your screen while you're working. You can also drag icons from the Sidebar and dock them where you want on your screen. If you have a small screen, however, they could be cumbersome and may get in the way so choose which ones you really want carefully.

New gadgets are added all the time by Microsoft as new ones are created. To add Gadgets to your Sidebar, right-click the Sidebar icon at the base of your screen (bottom right-hand side). Select the Add Gadgets menu:

The Gadgets above might not be those that you see when you right-click on the Sidebar. Remember that with the fast-changing world of IT, new icons are appearing all the time.

More gadgets can also be found at the Microsoft Vista Gallery. As at the 7th December 2007 there are 1713 gadgets to choose from plus the opportunity to create and publish your own by joining the gallery developer centre . Each day new gadgets appear and cater for most tastes and hobbies. They are free to download from Microsoft, but some websites offer more gadgets and may charge you to download them.

Sidebar Properties

Selecting the Sidebar Properities enables you to select whether or not you want the Sidebar to appear when you start Windows or whether you always want it on top of other windows. You can choose the position of the Sidebar on your screen and if you have more than one monitor attached to your computer, you can select which to display it on.

You can view the running gadgets and remove any you no longer want using the menu which opens when you click View list of running gadgets . Remember that you can also close them by clicking on the X on the gadget itself.