In Windows 10, there is a new icon in the notification area of the taskbar called Action Center, which basically fixes the problem with notifications in Windows 8. Action Center stores all the notifications from the operating system. operating system and from your installed applications.
It also has action buttons that allow you to do some quick tasks like switch to tablet mode, create notes, connect to VPN, etc. In this article, I will talk about how you can Customize taskbar, notification area and actions. center in Windows 10. If you’re only interested in one section, just scroll down to the appropriate heading.
Table of Contents
Windows 10 taskbar
Start Menu
So what’s new in the Windows 10 taskbar? There are actually quite a few things. First, we have a Start button working again with links to apps, settings, etc, which makes a lot of people very happy.
The Start menu is a completely different thing, so I will write a separate post on how to customize it. It’s basically a combination of the Windows 7 start menu and the Windows 8 start screen. It’s actually quite useful, and I like it better than the standard Windows 7 start menu.
Cortana & Search
Right next to the start button is a new search box that also integrates Cortana, Microsoft’s virtual assistant software. You will see I’m Cortana. Ask me anything. notify if Cortana is enabled.
When you click on the search box, you’ll be asked if you’re interested in enabling Cortana. If you click Do not careCortana will be disabled, but you can still search desktop and web.
If you want to use Cortana, click Next and follow the instructions. Note that you’ll be removing a lot of your privacy by enabling Cortana. Before you click Using Cortana , you’ll see a list of items sent to Microsoft from your computer including your location, search history, calendar details, voice input, browsing history from Edge, and more. Many people have complained that too much information is sent to Microsoft and that is probably true.
To use Cortana, you also need to sign in with a Microsoft account. If you want to change Cortana settings, just click on the gear icon on the left and you can turn it off or on, enable or disable Bing search, etc.
If you don’t like how Cortana search box is using up space, just right click on the taskbar, go to Cortana and choose from Hide or Show Cortana Icon.
The first option will remove it completely and the second will just use the search icon.
Task View
The next new item on the Windows 10 taskbar is the Task View button. It’s basically like Mission Control on OS X if you’ve ever used a Mac. If you click on it, it will show you all the applications open on the current screen, and it will also show you any other screens.
In Windows 10, multiple desktops are finally a built-in feature. You can hide or show the Task View button by right clicking on the taskbar and clicking Show Action View button option.
You can also enter task view using hotkey Windows key + TAB. I wrote a detailed post on how you can switch between programs and the desktop in Windows 10, so be sure to check that out. Overall, it’s a great feature and works great.
Taskbar properties
If you right click on the taskbar and select Characteristicyou can customize a few more settings related to the taskbar.
This screen is very similar to older versions of Windows: you can lock the taskbar, set it to auto-hide, and use small taskbar icons. You can also adjust the position of the taskbar to the left, right, or top. Finally, you can choose how you want to combine the icons in the taskbar. By default, multiple windows from the same application will be combined.
At the bottom you can also turn on Peep to quickly preview the screen when you mouse over Show Desktop button. The Show Desktop button is still on the far right of the taskbar and is now a small part you can barely see.
Windows 10 notification area
Now let’s talk about the notification area in Windows 10. It is quite similar to the notification area in Windows 7, but it also has an Action Center icon, which is the farthest right icon that looks like a piece of paper with text on it. .
To configure the notification area, you can right click on the taskbar, select Characteristicand click Custom side button Notification area or you can click Begingo Settingclick System and then click Notice and action.
On this screen, you can actually customize both the notification area and the Action Center. First, let’s talk about the system tray and icons.
Click Select the icons that appear on the taskbar to select all the different application icons that you want to appear in the main area of the taskbar.
Note that if the value is set to Turn off, the icon will appear in the “additional icons” section that shows up when you click the little up arrow. If you switch it to Abovethe icon will move from the secondary icons section to the main taskbar.
It should be noted that you can also manually move the icons by simply clicking and dragging an icon between the taskbar and the sub-icons section. That’s actually easier than doing the settings.
If you click Enable or disable system icons, you can choose which system icons will appear on the taskbar. You can choose from Clock, Volume, Network, Power, Input Indicator, Location, and Action Center.
So from here, you can even turn off the Action Center, if you don’t find it useful. If you go back to main Notice and action page, you will see Notify section. This section controls which notifications you receive, which apps, and where they appear.
If you disable the first two options (Show me tips about Windows and Show app notifications), you will no longer receive any notifications from Windows other than system messages. Application notifications are the most common notifications you will see in Windows.
You can also choose whether you want notifications on the lock screen. For security purposes, some users may want to disable lock screen notifications. Finally, you can turn on hiding notifications during a presentation.
Just below this section are individual notification settings for each app. If you get a lot of notifications from a particular app, you can just turn it off and still get notifications from other apps.
Windows 10 Action Center
Finally, we have the Action Center. If you click that little icon on the taskbar, you’ll see a window that slides in from the right hand side of the screen.
Here you will see a scrolling list of all notifications from the system and from apps. At the bottom of the screen are the quick actions I mentioned earlier in this article. You can change which icons appear here by clicking the icon at the top in Settings and choosing a different icon.
On a desktop, you’ll see quite a few possible actions listed, but on a laptop, you might just see a row of four icons. Currently, you can choose from All Settings, Connections, Projects, VPN, Notes, Quiet Hours, Location, and Tablet Mode. Some of these only really apply to laptops or tablets, and won’t make much sense for desktop computers.
So that’s basically all it takes to customize the taskbar, notification area, and action center in Windows 10. It’s a big improvement over Windows 8 and packed with features. new to make the transition from Windows 7 affordable. If you have any questions, feel free to ask. Interesting!
