The Deskbar

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The Deskbar

The Deskbar is a roster of system services and applications. It's divided into three sections: The Zeta Menu (the portion with the Zeta logo), the Status View (the darker area that displays the time), and the Application List (the list of running applications).

All operating system has a launcher for the applications installed on the system. In Zeta the launcher is called Deskbar. You can open most of the graphical applications (text-based applications have to be opened from the Terminal or through a small application called Execute...), through accessing the different application folders (CD-Tools, Develop, Graphics, Infomanagement, Internet, Music, Network, Office, System, Tools, Video).

Depending on the size and type of application, it may take some time to start. Most native applications start in a second or two, but ported applications often take considerable longer.

If nothing appears to happen after you attempt to start an application, a problem with the application may exist, or the application may not be installed. If you attempt to restart the application, and it still doesn't start, refer to the application's documentation for troubleshooting information.

The Zeta Menu
Click the Zeta logo in the Deskbar, and the Zeta Menu opens.

The Zeta Menu contains...
About Zeta.
Click this to bring up a panel that displays system information and credits.

Find...
Click this to bring up the system query panel.

Restart and Shut Down.
Both of these items shut down your computer. Restart starts it up again; Shut Down doesn't. (Note that neither of these commands can return you to any other operating system that you may have installed on your computer.)

If you're having trouble shutting down, you can force the BeOS to stop by typing Alt+Control+Delete twice. The first invocation will launch The Team Monitor, the second invocation will immediately shut down your computer.

Recent Documents, Recent Applications and Recent Folders.
These contain lists of recently-used documents and applications. As you open files, folders and launch applications, their icons are automatically added to the Recent... lists. From the Recent Folders list, you can easily access the folders' sub-folders as well.

The folders listed at the bottom of the Zeta Menu comprise the favorites list -- folders that you always want to keep at your fingertips. The list's default contents, shown in the illustration above, are folders full of sorted Zeta applications. You can add your own folders--and files--to this list simply by dropping the item on the Zeta logo at the top of the Deskbar.

You can also configure the favorites list through the Zeta Menu tab in the Deskbar Preference application.

Fast Launch

Fast Launch gives you a quicker access to your most commonly used applications. You can read more about how to customize this bar in Deskbar Preferences.

Status View - The Replicant Shelf in the Deskbar
The Status View displays icons and information about the current state of certain system components.

A system service or third-party application can add icons to the Status View to tell you that they're running, and to give you access to commands that control the service or app. You can for example click on the time and it changes to the date for a few seconds, and then returns to the time. You can also click and hold on the time to open a menu that lets you hide the time display, and then click and hold again where the time used to be to bring it back. To set the time and date, see the Time preference.

For more information about Status View, read about Replicants.

The Application List
The bottom portion of the Deskbar is taken up by the Application List, a list of currently running applications. When you launch an application, it's automatically added to the Application List. Click on an application in the list to pop open the app's App Menu ; this is a list of the app's windows, from which you can select a specific window to bring to the front of the screen. The App Menu also lets you hide, show, and close all windows that belong to the application. Window icons that appear gray in the App Menu (such as home, as shown here) represent windows that have been hidden. See also information about Show Team Expander that lets you have a list over all open windows directly in the Application List.

A hidden window can be "unhidden" and brought to the front of the screen just like any other window--simply select the hidden window in the App Menu. (To hide a window, double-click the window's title tab.) "Speedlines" next to a window icon (see apps in the illustration) indicate that the window is in a different workspace (or "virtual desktop").

Clicking on the icon displays the window by taking you to that workspace. See Workspaces for more information on workspaces.

You can open a file in one of the applications that's displayed in the Application List by dragging the file over to the list and dropping it on the app's icon. Not every application can open every type of file, however. If the application can handle the file, its list entry (in the Application List) will darken as you hold the file icon over the application's icon.

In the illustration, we've dragged a text file called Messages onto the entry for the Zeta text editor, StyledEdit. StyledEdit knows how to open the file, so its list entry darkens. If we drop the file icon, the file will open in StyledEdit. (The Numbers window is a file that's already open in StyledEdit.)

Moving the Deskbar
When you start Zeta, the Deskbar appears in the upper-right corner of the screen. To move it to any of the four corners or to spread it across the top or bottom of the screen, grab the dotted border at the right of the Status View and drag.

When the Deskbar is in the top left or top right corner of the screen, it can appear expanded or compact. By default, the Deskbar is expanded, as shown in the previous illustrations. To compact the Deskbar, press the dotted line (on the right of the status view) and drag up. When the Deskbar is compact, the Application List turns into a blackboard icon.

Clicking the blackboard pops open the Application List.

©2003-2004 by yellowTAB GmbH