Hello, my name is Shane Laurent and I’m a new employee at Falafel and truth be told new to Blogging.  My goal is to research new tools, technologies, and software methodologies and then share my findings with the readers of the blog.  So on to the topic of my entry “How to Clean Up Your Desktop Clutter”.

I don’t know about you but it seems my desktop always gets filled up with shortcuts to other applications or to websites that I want to be able to quickly access again.  I had always thought about writing an application to better organize my desktop, but like most things in life I never had time to do it.  So I finally decided to do a little “googling” and see what applications are out there for organizing the desktop. I found several different applications to handle this task and out of all the apps I looked at I picked two that I found to very slick. 

Rocket Dock

The first application is called Rocket Dock http://rocketdock.com which is a free application with several add-ons.  I highly recommend that if you install this application you download the Stacks Docklet add-on http://rocketdock.com/addons/docklets/1791.  If you would like to see a few videos showing how to install Rocket Dock and the Stacks Docklet add-on then click on the following YouTube video links:

A short video that shows Rocket Dock in action: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2rfPKEiiro&feature=related

To install Rocket Dock and add the Stacks Effect see this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3npL5L66__A

By the way, I'm currently using this application and it is very cool.

Object Dock

The second application is called Object Dock which is made by a company called Stardock.  They have a free version of the application and a plus version that cost around $20.  Here is a link to this application:

http://www.stardock.com/products/ObjectDock/downloads.asp#download

Don’t want a Dock

If you are not interested in installing a Docking application and just want to clean up your desktop then see the following link for some useful tips on how to get your desktop organized.

http://www.avesh.com/blog/DesktopZenReducingVisualClutterOnYourDesktop.aspx

For the Die Hards Who want it All!

If you really want to go crazy and change up your desktop then watch the video below

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6PVCaKTjiG8

Here is what you will need for this setup:

1). Xion http://xion.r2.com.au/

2). Switcher http://insentient.net/

3). Deskspace http://www.otakusoftware.com/deskspace/

4). Rocketdock http://rocketdock.com/

5). Stack Effect http://rocketdock.com/addons/docklets/1791

Please provide any comments or suggestions for blogs you would like to see in the future.  If you know of a different docking application please provide info on that as well.