Sunday, April 7, 2002
The Pros and Cons of Task Switching
Posted by Jeff Kirvin in "THOUGHT" @ 02:37 PM
I stopped using WISbar today. I've lost count of how many times I've switched back and forth from WISbar to GigaBar to PocketNav to the stock HP Task Switcher that came with my Jornada to not even that.
Skinnable title bar replacements like WISbar and Gigabar look cool, and they make jumping from one app to another a simple one-tap process, but they also take up significant system resources and have a tendency to lock up on me at the worst moments.
Pocket Nav and the stock switchers that come with devices (HP Task Switcher, the iPaq's iTask, etc.) are much smaller and stay out of the way, but they're also more of a pain to get to.
Sometimes -- okay, now -- I get to thinking that maybe I'd be happier just sticking with the system as Microsoft originally designed it, using the Start Menu's recent app cache to toggle between stuff and the Memory Settings applet to close hogging applications, and don't worry about the rest. Very un-Type A of me, but it's refreshing, in a way.
Until I see the newest cool WISbar skin...
Skinnable title bar replacements like WISbar and Gigabar look cool, and they make jumping from one app to another a simple one-tap process, but they also take up significant system resources and have a tendency to lock up on me at the worst moments.
Pocket Nav and the stock switchers that come with devices (HP Task Switcher, the iPaq's iTask, etc.) are much smaller and stay out of the way, but they're also more of a pain to get to.
Sometimes -- okay, now -- I get to thinking that maybe I'd be happier just sticking with the system as Microsoft originally designed it, using the Start Menu's recent app cache to toggle between stuff and the Memory Settings applet to close hogging applications, and don't worry about the rest. Very un-Type A of me, but it's refreshing, in a way.
Until I see the newest cool WISbar skin...
