Aerial

Note: The password for the archive is "CA"

Aerial is a curious piece of software designed to do one simple job — to claim spaces on your desktop without turning them into black boxes. The app reserves space on your desktop so actions like maximizing or fullscreen will have no effect over the targeted area, which allows you to fix widgets or other quick-use tools that may help you with your activities.

First of all, the application is portable, so no installation process is required. Secondly, after the first launch, your attention should focus on the taskbar, as there is no effect that lets you know the app is running, except for the little icon in the taskbar, and you can easily believe that the app is not responsive or works with delays.

Also, there is no close button to it as well, but the Hide button takes that role and sends the interface back to its initial place.

To isolate the areas on your desktop you have four boxes to work with. The boxes represent the four coordinates of your screen — top, bottom, left, right. Each coordinate has a thickness field which holds the values you input and alters the screen accordingly. You can use one box at a time, multiple or all four, the app has no restrictions regarding this aspect.

Aerial can be set to run at startup, by checking the box with the same name. Regarding the reserved space, you can roll that back by bringing the values to 0 as closing the app won't reset the changes made to your screen.

Aerial, overall, is a neat utility that can help you claim spaces on your desktop in order to allow other apps to run without being overlapped by folders or other software. The action is based on tickboxes and value input and doesn't require any skills to successfully operate it.