Making the Windows desktop more functional?

[Deleted member 68110]

Is there anything that makes the Windows desktop environment more functional without looking 30 years out of date?

I hate having pokey little symbols of my documents, or my drive shortcuts or shortcuts to apps cluttering up my desktop - it looks the same as Windows has looked for 30 years.

Is there an app that means different sections of the screen have different purposes - maybe larger areas representing shortcuts to certain places, or a dock even like in Linux and iOS?

Basically anything to get away from the crappy little icons, and the lumpy start menu?

Thanks a lot for any suggestions.

 

[ttaskmaster]

You mean something like Fences?
https://www.stardock.com/products/fences/

I suppose the alternative would look like a Windows phone

 

[Rroff]

Though Windows 10 has undone some of it in 7 and to a lesser extent 8 the icons are high res and rescalable using the relevant options and you can enable various toolbars from the task bar and reposition and customise them a fair bit. Not quite as flexible as some of the docker bars in other OSes though.

EDIT: Just remembered you can't move them off the taskbar like you could in XP, etc. without using 3rd party software - used to be quite handy back in the day for dedicated machines, etc.

 

[Deleted member 68110]

You mean something like Fences?
https://www.stardock.com/products/fences/

I suppose the alternative would look like a Windows phone

Thanks guys - Fences is the sort of thing - I was just hoping for something a bit bolder - like the ability to have something like a bauhaus desktop...

.. where one section is a functioning clock, another is a link to files, another is the games library - that sort of thing.

 

[chroniclard]

a folder.....?

 

[D3K]

I used to use customize.org around 15 years ago, and names like hoverdesk stick out in my mind.

All I can say is you need patience if you want something so drastically different, as the concept is much simpler than the execution.

 

[SimonC]

I haven't used it in many years but have a look at rainmeter it might do what you want.