Make a To-do list your desktop's background wallpaper
By Zatni Arbi
JAKARTA (JP): Wouldn't it be nice to be able to quickly check your list of tasks at any time, so that you always know what to tackle next? There are a number of nice programs that you can use for this purpose, including SideKick for Windows and Microsoft's own Outlook. However, I have found that working with the program that we use all the time makes more sense because we do not have to call up another program just to remind us what we are supposed to do next.
In my case, I work mostly with Winword. Therefore, I always create my To-do list in Winword. I name it Today's Tasks. I can revise it as often as I need to and I save it under the same name each time. Then I capture an image of the page and place it as the background wallpaper of my desktop. When I need to see the items on the list, all I have to do is minimize all open programs until the desktop is exposed. Or, if I happen to be working in Winword, I can simply open the Today's Tasks file. I've found it very handy.
Here are the steps that I take: First, I prepare a list of all the specific tasks that I have to complete for today. Then, I create the list of calls that I have to make and the names of people that I have to contact. Finally, I add the list of long- term projects that I am working on continuously. The list should not be too long; it should not exceed the height of the screen. The font size should be between 14 and 16, depending on the screen resolution.
A white desktop would not be attractive because it would be too glaring on our eyes. Luckily, when working in Winword, I always work with a blue background and white fonts to reduce eyestrain. If you want to do this, click on Winword's Tools menu item, and click on Options. Then click on the General tab and activate the Blue background, white text option.
The left side of our desktop is usually crowded with shortcut icons. Therefore, the To-do list should be shifted a little to the right so that it will not be covered by the icons when it's placed on the desktop. To accomplish this, all I have to do is increase the left margin of the document. I click on the File menu item, and then on Page Setup. In the dialog box that appears, increase the margin to three inches or four inches, again depending on the screen resolution and the population of our desktop icons. You can experiment to find the right size for the left margin.
Remember that you should make your list attractive and easy to read. You can play around with the fonts and the bullets, and you can even add borders and shading and change the colors of the text. After all, it's your desktop, and a desktop's wallpaper should always be cute. Luckily, you can do a lot of things in Winword, including adding a picture or two to the page.
Once my To-do list is completed and I'm happy with its look, the next step is to display the page in the Full Screen mode because I don't want all the Winword menus and toolbars to also appear in my wallpaper. So I click on the View menu item, and then on Full Screen. Voila! Now I've gotten rid of all the bars. However, I still have this floating Close Full Screen button that I should click on when I want to get out of this mode. It turns out that I can drag this button to the left edge of the screen and it will turn into a inconspicuous vertical bar.
I usually have to nudge the page a little to make sure that the heading Today's Tasks is aligned with the top edge of the screen. This is easy to do once you know how. Press the Page Down key once or twice so that the page scrolls down and then press the up arrow key until the cursor reaches the top most line. Now the title is already right on top of the screen. Perfect!
What I have to do now is capture an image of the entire screen and create a bitmap file of it. All it requires is for me to press the Print Screen key. You'll find the key to the right of the F12 key. This will capture the screen and place the image on Windows' Clipboard.
Paint
Next, I call up Windows' Paint program, which is found in the Accessories folder. Once the program is loaded, I press Shift-Ins to paste the image from the Clipboard into it. Once it is pasted, I can save the file under the name Today's Tasks. Paint will automatically save it in the BMP format, which is the format used for desktop wallpapers.
Paint has a special command that allows us to directly change the current desktop wallpaper to the image we've opened in this program. Just click on the File menu item, and then click on Set As Wallpaper (Centered). Because the size of image file is exactly the size of the screen, we will have the wallpaper covering the entire desktop. When I close Paint and Winword, I will get the screen exactly as shown in the accompanying picture.
The drawback in putting your To-do list on the desktop is that you cannot include sensitive or confidential information in it. However, as I work mostly at home and therefore enjoy a high degree of privacy, this works well for me.
Updating the list may seem to be too tedious a chore at first, but as you do it regularly it will become easier and faster to complete. Besides, it's always a good idea to start your day at the computer by first taking some time checking and updating your To-do list, isn't it?