Hi, Rileore.
There's no feature named "column bar" in Vista. I think what you mean are
the column headers in Windows Explorer.
The User Interface of Windows Explorer is highly customizable. But, of
course, since we CAN customize it, then we MUST customize it, unless we are
happy with the default settings.
In Vista, the designers may have gone too far with this. Explorer tries to
determine what kind of files are in each folder and choose the proper
template to display the files in that folder. The "Pictures and Videos"
template offers many (dozens!) of columns of metadata, such as Name, Date
Taken, Tags, Rating, Size, Dimensions, and others. To see the full list,
right-click on any column heading and choose More... from the context menu.
In addition to WHICH columns to display, we also can choose how wide each
column should be. The first choice is "Size column to fit". If the first
column (Name?) includes an entry with a very long name - and many picture
files do have very long filenames - then that first option may make the
column so wide that we can't see the header for the second column It may
appear that there is only a single column, especially if the Navigation Pane
(on the left) and the Preview Pane (on the right) have been toggled ON and
if the Explorer window is not maximized. In an extreme case, the column
label ("Name") may be so far from the left margin that it has disappeared
off the right side of the window. The "column bar" should still be there,
but blank, with no apparent label in it. There should be a horizontal
scroll bar at the bottom, but it is easily overlooked. This confusion can
be compounded by the choice to show Large Icons or Tiles or some other
"View", rather than Details, which we may be more accustomed to seeing.
My suggestion is to invest some time in exploring the many viewing options
for Windows Explorer. Unfortunately, the option settings are scattered in
the UI. There is a Menu Bar, but it is turned off by default; you can
toggle it on momentarily by pressing <Alt>, or (semi-)permanently by
clicking Organize | Layout. On this Layout menu is where you can also
toggle the Navigation, Preview and Details Panes. In addition to the Views
button on the Command Bar (where we choose Small Icons, Details, etc.),
there is also a View button on the Menu Bar.
Click this View button on the Menu Bar, then click Customize this folder...
Here you can choose the "template" for this folder. For most folders you
will want to set it to Documents or All Items, rather than the Pictures or
Music choices. You also can check the box to "Also apply this template to
all subfolders".
These settings seem quite fragile, and I have to re-set mine from time to
time. :>(
RC
--
R. C. White, CPA
San Marcos, TX
(e-mail address removed)
Microsoft Windows MVP
(Running Windows Live Mail 2008 in Vista Ultimate x64 SP1)
