Talk:Taskbar

I propose changing all these references to system tray as it is almost exclusively known as that these days (even by microsoft ) with a line about it's original name. I think this will be less confusing to the majority of readers. --neonwhite user page talk 13:48, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

That would be incorrect and I've added a citation to the article. Officially the area where icons are located is called the "taskbar notification area". I agree that it can be confusing to users, and that's why the "system tray" reference is noted and not deleted.

Charles Oppermann (talk) 00:56, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

It is not incorrect but simply what it is known as now even by microsoft as i have pointed out ("Microsoft Time Zone conveniently runs in the system tray") Personal views do not change this fact. Wikipedia has always reflected common usage not old terms that are no longer in use. We cannot make the judgement that it is incorrect, this is a violation of WP:NPOV as it only represents a single persons POV that is not the common view. --neonwhite user page talk 13:48, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

The Time Zone application is not developed by the shell team and is not shipped with the operating system. Just because there is an error in web page describing the tool is not evidence enough. Please refer to the citation I gave which is pretty definetive on the subject. I'll try a different wording because I do not wish to see a incorrect (but common as you say) usage perpetuated by Wikipedia.

Charles Oppermann (talk) 14:44, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

It's not up to you to decide that something is in error because you don't agree with it. The fact remains that system tray is common usage and are preferred over obsolete terms that are no longer in common use. PC World refer to it as system tray as do Symantec , IBM , Mozilla , AOL , apple , Sun Microsystems , BBC , NBC , CNN Microsoft The logical way it should read is to title it system tray but note it's original name and that it is now almost exclusive known as the system tray. --neonwhite user page talk 23:36, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

When you say "almost exclusively known as the system tray" you discount the included help file, the online Windows Help and Support Center, Windows Vista User Experience Guidelines, and developer documentation.

This is a very petty argument. All I'm asking is that the text note that the name "system tray" is incorrect. Here's analogy: if your name is Bob, but some people (including some members of your famiy) call you Dick, what should your Wikipedia entry say? Given your logic, your Wikipedia entry should not mention your real name at all, because Dick is the popular usage.

This is not my opinion and I don't understand why you keep saying it is given the references I've cited previously. Yes, some people call it something else, even within Microsoft (but not the team that writes that code), but that does not make them correct. The name doesn't change because of popular usage. We can agree to disagree on this, but I think it's wrong of you to keep undoing my edits, I'm just noting that while "system tray" is a common usage, it is also incorrect usage. I have provided more than ample evidence to support this. We can continue to undo each other's edits, but assumeing WP:EQ we should work together on this. Question to you - why is my proposed text "(commonly - but mistakenly[cite] - referred to as the 'system tray')" objectionable to you? Will you provide alternative text that attempts to reconcile?

Charles Oppermann (talk) 02:58, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

The original citation I gave^[1] was also published in a book(Chen, Raymond (2007). The Old New Thing. Addison-Wesley. pp. 47–49. ISBN 0-321-44030-7.). Both the book and and the blog are authored by a developer on the Windows shell team and helped create the taskbar. Here's how the section starts: "Why do some people call the taskbar the 'tray'?":

Short answer: because they're wrong. ... One of the most common errors is to refer to the taskbar notification area as the tray or the system tray. This has never been correct. If you find any documentation that refers to it as the tray, you've found a bug.
"But why do you care? That's what everybody calls it now, may as well go with the flow."
How would you like it if everybody started calling you by the wrong name?
Summary: It is never correct to refer to the notification area as the tray. It has always been called the "notification area".

Emphsis is mine. Given that I've cited both a online and printed source from an acknowledged expert, and several other authoritative citations, and provided recent examples from those current and authorative sources (mainly the Windows Vista Help and Support Center); I'm going to restore my edit. I'll ask that before you undo the edit, that you provide a reason before that goes beyond the previously cited examples - which are not authortative and considered to be in error by the creators of the thing we are talking about. Charles Oppermann (talk) 02:19, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

What makes Chen's views relevant? Just because he was involved in some aspect of the shell's development hardly makes him an authority or relevant source about what things should be called. I think you're going to have to do better if you expect to have your assertion that the common term is incorrect stand. — Aldaron • T/C 03:21, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Contrary to this microsoft developer, Adobe developers use the term system tray and have also developed on AIR class called SystemTrayIcon. --neonwhite user page talk 03:34, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

I think you misunderstood. Of course names and terms change by common usage. This is fundamental principle of etymology. If it were not true then we'd still use the exact same terms as we did thousands of years ago. Language develops and changes, that's just what happens, dictionaries are continually changed to reflect this. This is an important point to improve the article. wikipedia represents common usage of terms not obselete and rarely used terms regardless of who favours them, thats the bottom line. You cannot make the decision that one term is correct and the other is not based solely on one persons personal opinion when the majority appose. Wikipedia is not there to tell people what is right, we are not language police, it is not our job to decide what use of language is correct. It is on this point were you are misunderstood.

The simply fact is that system tray is almost exclusively the term used these days. It is neither correct nor incorrect, it is just obviously the case. The views of one person represent no more than a fringe POV that controvenes the mainstream views. This violates the whole principle of NPOV policy and is exactly what the policy was designed to stop. Assert facts, including facts about opinions—but do not assert the opinions themselves.{WP:ASF) I've provided overwhelmimg evidence that 'system tray' use is prevalent by nearly all mainstream companies and publications. One single person does not counter that. The only way his view could be included is by stating that it is his opinion. Language has changed and wikipedia needs to reflect that. You can't add a personal point of view to the article as if it were fact as my original edit was to ammend a bad piece of NPOV violation there is no reason why it shouldnt stand, continually reverting these edits is not helpful. You're are trying to make moral decisions on the use of language based on a single POV, who cannot represent that it's not objective and it's not the way wikipedia works. --neonwhite user page talk 03:29, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm at a lost here. We are describing a technology that is developed by a single company. That company has named the technology a certain way and refers to it in it's documentation that way. We're not talking about something generic.

"You're are trying to make moral decisions on the use of language based on a single POV"

You keep saying that this is my opinion or my personal point of view, but I've cited several authoritative sources, including the recent product documentation, and one of the original developers of the technology that speaks directly to the issue at hand. I don't understand how can continue to say I'm making a "moral decision" on a "single POV".

You are the one who keeps saying it's "almost exclusively the term used these days" which is your own POV. What terms Adobe uses to refer to Microsoft products is solely their issue and is hardly representative. Charles Oppermann (talk) 10:06, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

You have only provide the opinion of one person this is not fact and cannot be represented as such. What microsoft called ii originally is irrelevant if everyone (including alot of microsoft's own documentation ) knows it as something else that is what wikipedia should represent. We cannot say that something is wrong or right full stop, let alone base that on a single person's POV. This is simply wikipedia policy. I have shown the use of 'system tray' term is wide spread and used by developers, journalists and major computer corporations these represent a far greater weight than a single persons opinion. It is simply common sense that it is the preferred term. Adobe developers are just as important on this subject as any other developers. --neonwhite user page talk 22:37, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

As a compromise how about referring to notification area as the 'official' name and system tray as an 'unofficial' name? --neonwhite user page talk 04:51, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

No. Just because a lot of people use the wrong term, doesn't make the wrong term correct. Given that you apparently didn't even know who Raymond Chen was when you decided to describe him as an "unreliable source" pretty much authoritatively proves that you don't know what you're talking about. The original text was correct. Leave it alone. -/- Warren 07:25, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

There is no such thing as a wrong or right term. This is the major mistake being made. Read WP:NPOV {Assert facts, including facts about opinions—but do not assert the opinions themselves.). There is no right or wrong and we certainly do not get to dictate on a wikipedia article which is which. Wikipedia represents facts not opinions and it doesnt attach values. We can say it's not an official term but we can't attach value to it. --neonwhite user page talk 22:37, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

First of all, you don't need to quote WP:NPOV at me; I've been working on the encyclopedia a lot longer than you have, and have more than twice the number of edits you have, and am well-versed in the subject matter. Check my user page if you doubt any of this.

Second, as Raymond Chen has stated (and this statement was published in his book, by the way) the misnaming is pretty widespread, even to the point where it's been used by Microsoft employees. To the untrained eye, this seems counterintuitive, or that both names are correct. Microsoft is a huge company, and quite often you'll have articles written by people who don't communicate with the teams who write the documentation. If they had, they would read things like this from the Windows Vista User Experience Guidelines:

When referring to the notification area: Refer to the notification area as the notification area, not the system tray.

or this from the Windows XP user documentation:

The notification area is the collection of small icons near your system clock, in the bottom-right corner of your screen.

or how about MSKB 310429:

This step-by-step article describes how to remove items from the notification area. The notification area is incorrectly called the "system tray" by many people.

You'll never find anyone claiming that "system tray" is the correct name, however... especially not after the person who designed the damned thing said that that's wrong. You will, however, find a lot of older references like this:

The notification area (formerly known as the "system tray") will be less crowded with the notification area cleanup turned on.

Formerly, eh? In what version of Windows was this the case that it was called the system tray?

Now let's look at a practical example of why we need to say that "system tray" is incorrect (apart from the fact that I found two more references that say precisely that). My name is spelled Warren. If you got a thousand people to say, "no, his name is spelled Wahreun", that doesn't make those thousand people correct unless I say it's correct. The fact that a thousand people spelled my Wahreun because they didn't know that it's spelled Warren could probably be mentioned in a Wikipedia article on me, but if I explicitly make a statement saying, "no, it's spelled Warren!", then, by definition, alternative spellings are authoritatively incorrect, and must be identified as such. They are all incorrect. This has nothing to do with "opinion", and WP:NPOV doesn't have anything to do with it. Official names, as defined by their creators, aren't a matter of opinion or what is commonly used.

Finally, a reminder about your behaviour here: You removed the authoritative source that disproves your point, in order to back up your argument, and you're continuing to add POV tags without respecting your fellow editors enough to write an edit summary saying what you're doing. Dude, this is weak. You've been around long enough that you should know that kind of shit doesn't fly on Wikipedia. Do yourself a favour and back away from this one -- you aren't going to get your way by edit warring. Okay? -/- Warren 23:23, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Let's calm down a bit. I think it's clear from the history of the term "system tray" that there's no meaningful sense in which the term can be said to be "mistaken". "Unofficial" (as suggested by [User:Neon white|Neon white]]) is a much more accurate characterization, but even that is hardly necessary to mention: many elements of software systems have (sometimes many) unofficial names, and we don't make a practice of belaboring the distinction between those and the "official" ones when the unofficial ones are in wide use or have clear histories. In fact, I'd argue that rather than emphasizing that the term "system tray" is "mistaken", I'd mention that it is the original term. — Aldaron • T/C 21:47, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

But that's wrong. We have definitive, reliable sources that say so: Windows XP documentation. Windows Vista user interface guidlines. Raymond Chen, who was on the team that designed the feature. Go read his blog entry on the subject, now that I've restored it to the article after you removed it. And speaking of which, 'why are you removing reliable sources that don't agree with the point that you're trying to make, Aldaron? Why? What in the hell kind of purpose does this serve? The encyclopedia doesn't improve with this kind of bullshit behaviour. The original phrasing starts with the word "commonly", which acknowledges that the term "system tray" is in widespread use; the Chen source backs this up -- we can't remove that source because it backs up something that's stated in the article! -/- Warren 23:23, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

i won't speak to the question of what is currently the "official," "definitive," or "correct" name of the "system tray," but i can give you some history, if you're interested. i co-lead the microsoft team that designed the "cairo" user interface — the progenitor of the ui found in win95. in the earliest days of its design, i named the universally-accessible area at the bottom of the screen "the tray." i didn't particularly like the name, but at the time the area was for universally-accessible storage only. no buttons, no menus, just file-system objects. so it almost made sense. plus it was a bit of an in-joke — bill's nickname was "trey," so it caused a bit of a laugh. anyway, despite the mostly-crappy name and the fact that as the area's design progressed it included a space for menus and notification (among other things), the name — used to describe the area as a whole — mostly stuck. shortly before the cairo design was handed off to the win95 dev team, other names for parts of the tray began cropping up: "notification area," "command area," et cetera. when the central area of the tray began to include the representation of current "tasks" (running applications, or open windows), someone on the win95 team suggested "task bar," and some people began to use "task bar" (or "taskbar") to describe the entire tray. anyway, for what it's worth, that's the history.C-markma (talk) 23:10, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

i suppose i should also comment on the raymond chen quotation above:

Why do some people call the taskbar the tray? Short answer: because they're wrong.

to be fair, i have not read chen's book, so i may be missing in this tiny excerpt a larger and more cogent argument <g>, but long before it was called the taskbar, that particular component of the user interface was called the tray. in fact, this was the name used the first time the component was disclosed publicly, at an early pdc years before win95 was released. so, really, what does chen mean by "wrong"? unless he's channeling some platonic microsoft marketing ideal (which is fine, as far as it goes), or advocating a time-line that begins at a rather late date in the component's history, i don't get it. C-markma (talk) 03:47, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

There was indeed something else in the beta builds of Windows 95 that was called a "tray", but it wasn't the thing that we call the "notification area" today. The tray predated the entire taskbar. That particular thing didn't make it into Windows 95, though, and referring to any user interface element in the taskbar as a "tray" is incorrect because there never, ever was a user interface element in the taskbar called a "tray". Here's the blog posting that explains this, and pay attention to the wording. There is a broken image on that page that demonstrates the original tray; here is the original image. Remember that he was on the team that designed this feature, and he's put his foot down and said "this is how it is". Understand that Wikipedia's policy on verifiability requires us to take his word above that of a pseudonymous poster on a talk page. You might be right, or you might be remembering it wrong, or you might be my uncle. I'm not saying I don't believe you, but keep in mind that the verifiability policy is our bulwark against people making shit up and tossing it in.... if you can provide some kind of reliable source that agrees with what you're saying, then we can put it into the article. -/- Warren 23:32, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

You seem very passionate about this issue, but if you read the comments in the sources you cite, you'll see that there's really quite a bit of dispute about this issue, in light of which one person's claims (Chen's) really can't be taken as having much authority. If C-markma started a blog and posted his history there would it suddenly become "verifiable"? My own memory of the history of the terms is precisely as C-markma describes it. That makes two people who were there from the beginning who believe that you're wrong in your crusade and in particular in your attachment to (a selective reading) of the Chen source. But since neither of us is "verifiable" (perhaps I should start a blog too) it seems we have to be content to move on and let you leave readers with an inaccurate article. — Aldaron • T/C 00:35, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

I want to make sure that one statement above doesn't go unchallenged.

"in light of which one person's claims (Chen's) really can't be taken as having much authority"

It's not one person though. That's just the one source that speaks the clearest to the issue. Source sources include the product documentation for the past several versions of Windows (inbox and available online).

it seems we have to be content to move on and let you leave readers with an inaccurate article.

How is the article "inaccurate?" Everything regarding this discussion has multiple references. Let me state it another way: If you think the article (which current says 'commonly - but incorrectly - known as the 'system tray') is inaccurate, then would you consider the Microsoft documentation on the subject to be inaccuracte? So if you sit down and press WIN+F1 and search on "taskbar"^[2] and it references "notification area" - that's inaccurate? Are you really trying to suggest that company that creates the technology, makes it available and documents its is WRONG because it's using a term that you think is not common enough?

Charles Oppermann (talk) 01:45, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Nobody is disputing that microsoft prefers the original term. Microsoft, however, do not dictate how language develops and if language has developed a different prefered term then wikipedia should reflect that. We do not get to attach a value to this or say that it is wrong that language has developed this way (which is what Raymond Chen is conducting, a pointless rant against etymology). We do not get to decide wrong from right. We can say some people call it this and some people call it that, we can say that one is an official name used by microsoft and one is a commonly used alternative derived from systray.exe, we can also say Raymond Chen doesnt like it and thinks it's wrong, we can say microsoft documentation says one thing, most others uses the alt. term but we cannot say that one is wrong and the other is right as if it were fact. This is policy and not up for discussion here. One guys' personal opinion from his blog does not change wikipedia policy. We can say is that the term is in common use but not preferred by microsoft. I think that demonstrates a good compromise. --neonwhite user page talk 02:32, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Can we use the diagram in this article . It seems to be a clear diagram of the elements of the taskbar but i'm not sure about the copyright issues? --neonwhite user page talk 15:17, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

The patent for the taskbar as it shipped in Windows 95 appears to be US5757371, which they filed for on Dec 14 1995. For what it is worth it uses the words "notification area". Patent 5825357 appears to refer to Cairo and is a "continuation" of an abandoned 1993 application. AlistairMcMillan (talk) 14:37, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

I've given up trying. I won't get into another edit war. This was all settled, but based on one person's reading of an old patent, they use that as justification for changing the *name* of the component in question. The patent in question refers to the Cairo-style interface, which was as a starting point during Windows 95 development and is not definitive. Regardless, the patent isn't the source of the name of the component; the documentation is. I've shown dozens of places in the documentation of the Windows product where it's called "[taskbar] notification area". That's the name of the portion of the taskbar, you can call it whatever you want, but that's not it's given name.Charles Oppermann (talk) 18:04, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

Are you happy with the article as it currently stands? Just in case someone edits before you read this, I'm referring to this version. AlistairMcMillan (talk) 19:08, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes I am, thank you. Charles Oppermann (talk) 05:01, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

Registry entries and header files of SDKs consistently refer to it as "SysTray". From this I gather that while users have to call it "taskbar notification area", programmers are required to call it "SysTray".--Jost Riedel (talk) 14:04, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Actually if you look closely, the systray APIs just refer to the functions that were controlled by the systray.exe application that Raymond Chen mentioned in his blog, not the actual taskbar notification area itself. AlistairMcMillan (talk) 23:32, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Which might as well be. It's not that I ever called this thing SysTray, nor that I am going to. It's just that I find it inordinately funny that people started some sort of a crusade over the question if a moniker that has been used is to considered incorrect or not. Keep up the good work!--Jost Riedel (talk) 10:06, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Do we really need a screenshot for each version? Most of the differences between the screenshots are really just differences in settings (some of them not even the default for the version shown):

• The theme or color scheme
• The presence and content of the Quick Launch toolbar
• The contents of the notification area
• What format the time is displayed in
• The size of the task buttons
• Whether or not the titles of running programs are shown

The only meaningful difference is the button for hidden notification icons and the Aero Peek button. - Josh (talk | contribs) 01:42, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

Sorry but you don't see any value in having a screenshot of the original implementation of the Windows taskbar, or a screenshot of the Windows taskbar that is going to be most familiar to readers? I've restored both.AlistairMcMillan (talk) 09:11, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

Could anyone update the KDE3 screenshot and description to KDE4 please? I am too biased. Kicker is no longer used at all and is gone with the end of KDE3, Plasma is now being used (and the Panel plasmoid).

What microsoft calls the notification area is called the System Tray on NON-microsoft freedesktop.org platforms. http://standards.freedesktop.org/systemtray-spec/systemtray-spec-latest.html i.e. it's not at all incorrect to refer it to system tray on linux and othe fd.o platforms. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.198.54.194 (talk • contribs) 04:00, May 1, 2010

In the beginning/lead of the article it would be valuable with a screen shot of an entire desktop to illustrate what the task bar is and where it is located. --Mortense (talk) 12:12, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

It would just make this article so neat and shiny. Thanks!

(Question, why doesn't Wikipedia auto-sign anonymous posts? doesn't it make sense that things SHOULD be that way? And also, why isn't there any "underline text" button in this form?

Thanks! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.125.191.144 (talk) 20:08, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

Would like to see some information integrated on the Microsoft taskbar patent http://www.google.com/patents/US5920316 98.127.132.122 (talk) 03:47, 22 June 2012 (UTC)

Windows 1.0 had a taskbar of sorts in which iconized programs would reside and I think it should be mentioned in the article. However, it wouldn't fit in the main Windows section, and it was never referred to as a taskbar, and its function wasn't exactly identical. So I propose creating a new section, "Predecessors". We would mention this feature in it, and move the implementations currently mentioned in "Other desktop environments" that precede Win95's taskbar to it. - Wikizzer (talk) 23:42, 4 November 2012 (UTC)

Why would the bar containing the charms be considered a type of taskbar? An appropriate place to discuss the charms is Windows shell. - Josh (talk | contribs) 23:22, 11 July 2013 (UTC)

If there is no objection I would like to move the charms content here to Windows shell. - Josh (talk | contribs) 20:28, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

Does the third party task bars really belong in the early implementation section? They seem to have been developed much later. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.78.148.35 (talk) 22:57, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

I want to do some little changes to the order of pictures in this section of the article. I think it will be better if the Windows 95 taskbar will be the first from the top, then the XP, 7, 8 and lastly the 8.1 version at the bottom. Though the pictures may be on discussion, I might improve the article by reordering the pictures such that they show the chronological order of the taskbar versons. Is my suggestion better than the current version, or should it be retained? Japanese Rail Fan (talk) 03:56, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Content overlap is significant. WP:SIZERULE also recommends a merger because readable prose size of Dock (computing) is at 2 KB. Taskbar article already has a section in it. Codename Lisa (talk) 10:13, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

This article needs to be updated to include Windows 10... Quick Launch is rumored to be hidden by default in recent versions of Windows but can perhaps still be activated in tricky ways, maybe even in Win10.-71.174.176.65 (talk) 13:55, 5 April 2016 (UTC)

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for speedy deletion:

• KDE Plasma 5 Taskbar.png

You can see the reason for deletion at the file description page linked above. —Community Tech bot (talk) 06:21, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

I noticed Notification area contained exactly the same text as Taskbar#Taskbar_elements so I redirected it here. Technically a merge I believe, except since the content was here, there was no content to copy into here. I am mentioning it here so there is some record of it on the target side. Sorry if I did it the wrong way, but WP:BOLD.

• I also copied the Wikipedia:WikiProject_Software interest tag over.
• I also noticed Notification Area (the same thing but with a capital A) was already redirecting here, so I added some reasons to that redirect page.
• I did not initiate a discussion as per the "Need for a merge is obvious" rules as per WP:MERGEINIT, WP:BB tsilb (talk) 00:41, 23 October 2019 (UTC)

Add a section that mentions the taskbar status icons. 111.88.15.221 (talk) 18:13, 29 October 2019 (UTC)

Windows 11 has been released for a while; its taskbar being added to the Windows section would be good. Is this OK? (NB: I don't have an image of the Windows 11 taskbar) by Mariobros12345 ^{(T • C)} 12:26, 12 December 2021 (UTC)