(Credit: Niels Laute)
Microsoft's PowerToys development team is playing around with a new feature that adds a "Command Palette Dock" to the top of the Windows 11 desktop. As Windows Central reports, this customizable menu would include PowerToys shortcuts, media controls, and more, making it easier to access than going through the Quick Settings menu.
PowerToys are Windows-enhancing tools that add things like more advanced copy-and-paste functions, a color picker, custom desktop layouts, and the ability to find where your cursor is with a quick double-tap on the Ctrl key. It's an ever-evolving collection, which is why developers are tinkering with the idea of a top-mounted dock, a bit like a second taskbar.
"The dock can be enabled from Command Palette settings and pinned to any edge of the screen," Niels Laute, a senior product manager at Microsoft, explains on the PowerToys GitHub. "You’d be able to pin your favorite extensions to the dock for instant access, without opening Command Palette or interrupting your workflow."
Laute showed off an early example of the dock with useful metrics like CPU and memory utilization, giving quick access to clipboard history, and the aforementioned media controls. The dock supports customization, too, letting you add favorite tools or change backgrounds and themes. You can also adjust the dock's location and pin it to the left, right, or bottom edge of the screen instead.
Although most of the feedback Laute has received has been positive, one comment keeps coming up: Why can't we just move the standard Windows taskbar? Windows 10 allowed people to drag the taskbar to the side of the screen and position it vertically, but that was removed in Windows 11. This new PowerToys feature might be a step toward bringing it back.
At the moment, this is just something that Laute and his team are playing around with. You can experiment with it using the dev/migrie/f/powerdock branch of PowerToys; more details are available on the GitHub page.