Customize Windows Save As Bookmarks

"Save As Bookmarks" you say? What in the world are "Save As Bookmarks"? Well, frankly, I have no idea what they are actually called, but you'll all know what I'm talking about in a minute. The bar on the left hand side of the windows Save As dialog has five predetermined, supposedly commonly used, folders for you to pick from. These would be handy, except who has ever actually saved something to their Network Places? Or to My Computer? Or even just in the top level of My Documents? No, if you're like me, and you're here so you probably either are or aspire to be, you are ultra organized in your folder hierarchies and these 'bookmarks' are simply jumping off points to navigating toward the correct folder.

I just heard an Obama commercial that ended with "The world as it is is not the world as it has to be." Now while it pains me to quote Obama here, and Mike may well edit this out... I wouldn't put it past him, the point is this. EVERYTHING IS CUSTOMIZABLE.

There are two simple, free programs that you can use to edit these 'bookmarks'

First, a program that is infinitely useful and that I highly recommend you install and play around with is TweakUI (download link on the right hand side about half way down the page) . It's a PowerToy from Microsoft that enables you to edit the way XP works and displays in several ways. It's something you'll want to keep installed on your computer. Follow this screenshot (custom folders require you to insert their path)

Second, there's a free program called Placesbar Constructer, apparently it's called the Placesbar, meh, I prefer "Save As Bookmarks". It's a bit easier to use than TweakUI for this specific purpose, but it's only use is this function. In my mind a program that only has one function has to be pretty awesome for me to award it a permanent place on my hard drive. Setting custom folders is easier in this program than in TweakUI, especially if you're looking for something hidden deep in the "documents and settings" folders, but after I discovered TweakUI can handle the custom keyed in folders, it became the clear winner.

The Result:
Before After

I'm sure I'll fine tune my starting off points as I observe my saving habits more, but it's nice to have the option of starting where I want.

[edit: I can't vouch for either of these in Vista... Both work fine using XP SP3]
__________
Share This Post!