Missing the old File, Edit, View menu bar?
One of the main concepts of Windows Vista is to make things more simple, basically take some of the complexity out of Windows.The decision was made to do away with the old menu bar in many of the windows of Windows Vista because they simply looked too busy and offered the user too many, often confusing, choices.
This all sounds great but we are power users and most of us like complexity because it gives us more control. Thankfully, Microsoft didn’t really do away with it completely, they just hid it. The next time you are using Windows Vista and wish that old menu bar was still around, just hit ALT on your keyboard and it magically appear!
Tags: complexity, confusing_choices, keyboard, magically, main_concepts, Microsoft, power_users, Windows, windows vista
Swillis on 19 Jul 2007 at 1:49 am #
Hi, What do you suggest when the ALT function doesn’t work as is should? When it won’t, usually the fixed menu items I had set also aren’t showing and the right-click won’t work either. Sounds like a resource problem to me but I have a dual quad machine with 3 gig of RAM, so what’s a fellow to do? Go back to keyboard commands? I don’t think so! Not for the price of this setup. Drop me a note if you have a suggestion. Thanks!
Swillis on 26 Jul 2007 at 12:53 am #
Swillis here again,
I’ve spent a lot of time researching this and believe I’ve come up with a fix. It seems it’s an old problem that still shows up in Vista. My fix is based on a similar problem with XP, that I found documented online at
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/555130, under the name, Menu bar/Toolbar Missing in Windows Explorer and/or Internet Explorer.
You’ll need a slight variation for Vista in that the registry
values aren’t quite where he says they were. And, the registry values have slightly different names. In XP (as per the document above), you’d delete the values named ITBarLayout; in Vista it’s ITBar7Layout; search for that and make sure it’s for the IE, and delete the two there. Then restart the computer.
Next: you can open IE and from within IE select TOOLS and you can
select the Menu Bar there. One can then make the same setting in Windows Explorer (WE) by Choosing Organize: Layout: Menu Bar. When the problem developed on my machine I could not select or deselect Menu Bar in IE under the Tools button.
Make sure you back up your registry before doing this.
Swillis
Not True on 27 Jul 2008 at 1:06 pm #
Ok, I have tried pressing ALT a million times and it does NOT restore the menu bar on my version of IE7. In the last few weeks we had an ‘automatic’ upgrade downloaded from Microsoft and they somehow - for some %%^^&&*%!$!@! reason - disabled the ability to disply the menu bar. DITTO for Tools > Menu Bar, it is ALWAYS checked and yet NO menu bar is displayed.
IMO - MS is a bunch of arrogant, ignorant, egotistical nerds who have no concept of what it means to research and validate their customer’s requirements. This does nothing but encourage the SAME attitude by well meaning - but inexperienced, book taught, and Culture bound - outsourced system developers in 3rd-world countries.
I have also tried some of the registry entry edits and they do not seem to work. Re-installing IE7 is a joke - so many versions available, and the fact that its an integral part of the OS makes reinstallation a time wasting crap shoot (WHAT THE XXXX WAS THE ANTITRUST LAWSUIT AGAINST MICROSOFT ABOUT IN THE LATE 1990S???? IT WAS ALL ABOUT INTERNET EXPLORER AND FORCED MS TO SEPARATE IT FROM WINDOWS-95/98??? WHY DOES THAT NO LONGER APPLY IN 2008.