Grouping Items on Windows Taskbar

Windows Vista is finally upon us and has a lot of nice features, but some are a little hidden.

The number of open windows prior to grouping on the taskbar is one of these features. If you want to change the value, you will have to use an addin or edit the registry manually.

To make the change in the registry,

• Start the Registry Editor
• Go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER \ Software \ Microsoft \ Windows \ CurrentVersion \ Explorer \ Advanced

Look for an entry named ‘TaskbarGroupSize’. If it exists, just change it’s value to the desired grouping otherwise continue as below

• Right-click an empty space in the right pane and select New > DWORD Value
• Name the new value TaskbarGroupSize
• Double-click this new value, and enter 2 (to group on two open windows) as it’s Value
• Close the registry editor
• Log off, or restart Windows for the changes to take effect

This small change will help keep your taskbar entries under control.