MiniBar & MiniBar Designer

The do-Organizer MiniBar is a free floating tool-bar that appears on your desktop when launched. This small utility is active when you first run do-Organizer and can stay active for as long as you wish. The buttons on the MiniBar give quick access to the sections and tools of do-Organizer. So you can close the main window of do-Organizer and have the MiniBar running with low system resource usage, enabling you to access email, bookmarks or other records with a minimum effort.

It works like a normal tool-bar. To move the MiniBar around your desktop, left click and hold the mouse down on the MiniBar move handle. (Cross arrow on the left or top left of the MiniBar - depending on your MiniBar layout).

do-Organizer comes with a few different MiniBar layouts, here are some examples:

A classic horizontal MiniBar, designed to fit on the top or bottom of your desktop:

A classic horizontal MiniBar with captions removed and only icons showing:

A vertical MiniBar that is better for the left or right hand side of your desktop:

So, how can I create my own MiniBar Layout?

The answer is simple: By using the MiniBar Designer! The do-Organizer MiniBar Designer enables you to create your own MiniBar or edit an existing MiniBar. You can freely move the buttons anywhere on the canvas area of the MiniBar Designer and you can show or hide the captions and adjust the size of the buttons.

To launch the MiniBar Designer, select from the MiniBar itself the "Layout and View Menu". See the screen capture below:

Alternatively you can launch the MiniBar Designer using Main-menu\Tools\MiniBar Designer. Additionally you can launch it from the desktop icon (a desktop icon was created when you installed do-Organizer, if you didn't delete it).  You can also find access to the MiniBar Designer in your Start\All Programs\GemX\do-Organizer\ MiniBar Designer.

It's a fairly simple utility to operate. I see three window panes. On the top-left corner is the objects windows (listing all the items that can be customized in MiniBar), on the bottom-left is the properties window (showing the selected object properties). Finally, on the right is the canvas window, this is where you will see the visual display of the objects. Precise adjustment should be made using the properties window, however you can move objects around and size them freely on the Canvas window. The MiniBar container can only be edited using the properties window.

When you launch the MiniBar Designer for the first time it will display all the available objects and the default layout so you can get started designing your own MiniBar.

The first thing you need to decide is, will your new MiniBar be horizontal or vertical. Then you should resize the MiniBar container using the properties window. Move a button or two so that you click on the MiniBar container. Click on it and adjust the values in the properties window accordingly. Now, you can begin to move and size the MiniBar buttons. To move a button, just click on it, hold your left mouse button down and move it to the desired location. The selected objects (buttons) on the canvas will show a selection marquee with resize handles on each side. Free form re-sizing can be done by clicking on any of these handles (while holding the left mouse button down) and moving it in the desired direction to achieve the size you want. Once you are happy with your design, click on the save as icon  on the MiniBar Designer tool-bar, give it an appropriate name and save it. That's all. You have just created a new MiniBar definition file.

MiniBar definition files are stored, and must be saved, in the do-Organizer System MiniBar folder if you want to use them in do-Organizer. This folder location will be (depending on your installation) something like:

C:\Program Files\GemX\doOrganizer\System\MiniBar

If you save the definition file anywhere else, then the file won't appear in the MiniBar styles list in the do-Organizer menu.

Each objects properties are the key to your design. This is where you define their look and behavior. For example if you don't want to show certain button on the MiniBar, click on the Display properties (editable section right-hand part):

"Caption and Icon"

"Caption Only"

"Icon Only"

"None"

In this case you would choose "None" as you don't want to show it at all.

Tip: It is better to position your buttons towards the MiniBar top left first, and then resize the MiniBar container accordingly to get results in a shorter time.