Visual Task Tips.... then a small blog post isn't going to do this justice!

One of the neat features in Vista is thumbnails of running windows when switching (alt-tab) or hovering over the task bar. But you don't have to wait for Vista to get that goodness in good old WinXP.

Alt-Tab image preview is available in a Microsoft supplied Power Toy "Alt-Tab Replacement" (there are a bunch of other goodPower Toys on that link)

Visual Task Tips is however a free third-party utility that gives you a much more pictorial tasktip that the usual tooltip that says "Outlook" or "Internet Explorer" - it actually shows you what's on the window in question.

It's got a tiny memory footprint and doesn't seem to consume any appreciable resources. And it supports multiple-desktop configurations. I think it's a great little utility as it helps me keep track of what's in what window... and you can recognise the picture a lot quicker than the words sometimes

One of the best graphical short-cut metaphors so far on a dektop is Expose on OSX and it's PC tributes (and extenders) but Visual Task Tips is a darn good little utility at a price that can't be beat!