These days there are many third party utilities that enhance the functionality of your desktop. Objectdock is one of those programs. It's very similar to the dock displayed on computers running Mac OS. The program adds a customizable shortcut bar, which supports drag and drop. It can also be set to show the running programs, just like the normal Windows taskbar.
You can even hide the Windows taskbar and use this program instead. Various animations of your dock objects are available. You can set the icons on your dock to zoom or spin when you move your mouse over them. The program also supports themes. Themes as well as docklets can be downloaded from the publisher's website. Docklets are small applications created for Objectdock. They enhance the usability of the dock by adding new features like battery life, clock, weather conditions display, Google search, and others.
Two sizes can be defined for the icons. You can set the size of the icons when they are displayed normally as well as their size when you move your mouse over them. Transparency level adjustment is also supported. The thing I like most is that the program can represent each minimized window by its screenshot.
Pluses: The program is very nice looking. It also is easy to configure. Memory usage can be configured by using the program's options menu. It can be set to use as few as 4 MB of your memory.
Drawbacks / flaws: If you replace your default Windows taskbar with this program you won't have access to your system tray icons anymore. You can install a plug-in to make them visible, but the one that I found displayed only some of my tray icons. The permanent solution is to buy this software and you'll have to access a couple of extra features including the system tray.
In conclusion: I like this program very much so I decided to use it. I normally don't use this kind of software but I'll make an exception for this one. It's free so you are more than welcome to try it too.
version reviewed: 1.5
by Soft32 Editors on 11/28/2006: "Free animated launchbar/taskbar!"
ObjectDock Publisher's Description
ObjectDock is a program that acts as both a task manager and a program launcher. It lets you organize your short-cuts and running tasks onto an extremely customizable dock that sits on your desktop. Users can customize the look of each item on the dock and set various animation options for when the mouse is over an item on the dock. It is very easy to configure.
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This download (ObjectDock) is freeware. "Freeware is copyrighted computer software which is made available for use free of charge, for an unlimited time, as opposed to shareware where the user is required to pay (e.g. after some trial period or for additional functionality)." More info at Wikipedia.
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Before you Download: 
This download (ObjectDock) is freeware. "Freeware is copyrighted computer software which is made available for use free of charge, for an unlimited time, as opposed to shareware where the user is required to pay (e.g. after some trial period or for additional functionality)." More info at 
