Installation

After having downloaded My Folders, simply run the myfolders-setup.exe file. This will install My Folders on your system. At the end of the installation, you will be prompted if you want My Folders to start with Windows. It is, of course, recommended to do so: My Folders is a program that needs to permanently run in the background while you are using your computer to be used.

Poping up My Folders

As soon as My Folder is run, it will display its icon in the system tray (the part of the Windows task bar where the clock is displayed). To activate the popup menu, simply hold the Windows key (if you have it on your keyboard it is the key with the flying Windows logo on it) and press the A key. The menu should popup under your mouse cursor. If you do not have the Windows key on your keyboard then click on the system tray icon: the menu should be displayed here. You will be able to change the keyboard shortcut that activates My Folders later.

If this the first time you run My Folders then you should have one item in the menu: a shortcut to the My Documents folder. Select it: a new Explorer window should appear listing the contents of the My Documents folder!

When the current window is an Explorer window, an Open/Save file dialog or a Browser for Folder dialog, you can also right-click on any of the small buttons on the right of the title bar (minimize, maximize, help or close). This allows you to popup the My Folders menu without using your keyboard.

My Folders and Explorer Windows

By default if My Folders is poped up when the active window is an Explorer window then My Folders will change the location of the window to the location you selected in the My Folders menu (to be able to do this you must display the Address Bar in Explorer windows: select View > Toolbars > Address Bar in an Explorer window's menu). You can change this behavior and have My Folders always open a new Explorer window by activating the appropriate option (see below).

However holding the Shift key while you select the shortcut (do not hold it before otherwise the My Folders menu will not appear) reverts this:

• if you did not activate the "Always open a new Explorer window" option then instead of changing the location of the current window My Folders will open a new window because you are holding the Shift key,
   
• if you did activate the "Always open a new Explorer window" option then My Folders will change the location of the current window again just because you are holding the Shift key.

My Folders and Open/Save file dialogs

My Folders behaves differently if you pop it up while the active window is an Open/Save file dialog. In that case instead of opening a new Explorer window when you select a shortcut, My Folders will simply change the location of the file dialog allowing you to access even more efficiently your files from any^* applications!

Again if the active window is a file dialog and you do not want My Folders to change the dialog's location but you want to force it to open a new Explorer window, just hold the Shift key when you select the shortcut in the My Folders menu.

*: any application that uses standard Open/Save file dialogs (which is the majority of applications): Notepad, Wordpad, Paint, Adobe Photoshop, WinAMP... Microsoft Office 2000/XP use non-standard file dialogs but a trick is implemented in My Folders to make it work with the Microsoft Office Suite. Although we have worked out a solution for Microsoft Office, it is not possible to have My Folders work with all the applications that use customized file dialogs.

My Folders and Browse for Folders dialogs (Windows 2000 and XP only)

My Folders can also drive Browser for Folders dialogs. This is the dialog where an application prompts you to select a directory. In that case all you see is a tree with the all the folders of your system.

If you activate My Folders when such a dialog is opened, My Folders will set the dialog to the folder you selected and close the dialog thus validating your choice. If you do not want My Folders to close the dialog but still select the folders you chose, you can hold the Control key while clicking in the My Folders menu.

If you hold the Shift key while clicking the My Folders menu, then My Folders will not interact with the Browse for Folders dialog and will open a new Windows Explorer window.

My Folders and special applications

My Folders has been customized to work in a particular way with some applications. As before, hold the Shift key when working with these applications if you want to have an Explorer window opened. Here are those applications:

• cam2pc: My Folders is able to change the location of the Image Browser.
   
• WinZip: My Folders is able to change the location of the Extract to... window.
   
• Power Archiver: My Folders is able to change the location of the Extract to... window.
   
• SmartFTP: My Folders is able to change the location of the Local Browser.
• Filezilla: My Folders is able to change the location of the Local Browser.

Customizing My Folders

To add/delete shortcuts in My Folders, or customize My Folders popup the menu (with the keyboard shortcut or by clicking on the system tray icon) and choose the Setup item. This will display the My Folders Setup dialog. The first part is where you define the shortcuts you want to appear. The second part lists some general settings described later. The last part is to customize the keyboard shortcut that activates My Folders.

Let's start with the General Settings:

• Load with Windows: this defines if My Folders should be started when Windows starts. Again it is recommended to let this activated.
   
• Show icon the system tray: it is safe to uncheck this box if you want to save some space in your system tray. As long as you properly set the keyboard shortcut, you will be able to activate My Folders only with it.
   
• Integrate My Folders...: if this is checked then when you right-click on a folder in an Explorer view, then a "Add to My Folders" item will be added. If you select it, then the clicked folder will automatically be added to your list of shortcuts. Once you have defined all the folders you want to appear in My Folders, you can uncheck this so as not to overload the folders' contextual menu in Explorer.
   
• Action to perform: if you choose Explore then the folders will be opened displaying the Explorer tree on the left (as when you explicitly launch the Windows Explorer from the Start Menu).
   
• Always open a new Explorer window...: if this is checked then My Folders will always open a new Explorer window instead of changing the location of the currently active one. Remember that you can toggle the general on a per-usage basis by holding the Shift key while you select the shortcut in the My Folders menu.

Now with the keyboard shortcut:

• None: if you choose this the then "Show icon in the system tray" box will be force checked. Clicking on the system tray will be the only way to activate My Folders.
   
• Windows key...: only choose this option if your keyboard features the Windows key (with the flying Windows logo on it). Then select the character key that you like. Some keys are not listed (eg. D, E, F...) because they are already used by Windows.
   
• Other shortcut: if your keyboard does not have the Windows key then this is your choice. After having selected this option, click in the box on the right of it and press any key combination that you like. Of course you should avoid any simple keystroke (like A) or any widely spread shortcut (like Ctrl-C) because whenever you press this key combination My Folders will be activated!

Working with your shortcuts

Adding a new shortcut

Click on the Add button. A window with a tree listing all the folders on your system will appear: choose the folder that you want a shortcut for and click OK. A new dialog will appear allowing you to edit some parameters:
 
• First you can see the full path to the folder. The only way to change this is to click on the button on the right and choose another folder.
   
• Then you can see the title: this is the text that will be displayed in the My Folders popup menu. You can type whatever you want here. You can use the Format button to quickly get a short text.
   
• The icon shows the icon that will be displayed next to the title (on its left actually). You can select any icon the combo or click the Icon Options... button to customize even further the icon.
   
  • Reset to default icon: if you have changed the icon and want to come back to the icon as it is displayed in Explorer choose this item.
     
  • Use default system icon file: Windows has a file called shell32.dll where all the standard Explorer icons are stored. Choose this item to quickly access the icons of this file. Once you have chosen this, the icon combo should have been updated with the icons listed in this file.
     
  • Choose custom icon file: choose this item to pick any file on your system that contains icons (typically the extensions are .ico, .exe and .dll). Once you have chosen a custom file, the icon combo should list the icons contained in the file.
    
  • Get more icons: redirects your browser to a page containing a list of Internet sites that propose free icons to customize your system.

Editing a shortcut

Select any shortcut and click the Edit button. The same dialog as described above appears. Refer to the above section for details on how to use this dialog.

Removing a shortcut

Select any shortcut and click the Remove button. A confirmation message will appear before the deletion is done.

Moving up/down a shortcut

Select any shortcut and click one of those buttons to move it the list.

Registering My Folders

My Folders is a shareware application. The version you download from the web must be activated with a serial number to unlock some limits:

• The unregistered application can only be used for 30 days after the first run.
• The unregistered application does not allow more than 3 shortcuts to be managed.

For details on registration please refer to: http://www.nabocorp.com/myfolders/register.php.