TicTac

Having to work with an abundance of windows in a single desktop, let alone a single monitor can be a real pain. The latest iteration of Windows attempts to make this easier by introducing multiple desktops, but it might not be enough. As such, applications like TicTac help you by allowing quick positioning of windows according to a grid, using hotkeys.

A neat advantage is that there’s no setup involved to take up any of your time or effort, so you can easily store the application on a USB flash drive to have it at hand, regardless of the computer you’re working on. Registry entries remain intact during runtime, so there’s no need to worry about the health status of the target PC.

The application always stays minimised to the tray area, leaving the entire desktop space to yourself and windows you need to work with. The associated menu makes it easy to view the documentation file for more info, and access the hotkey configuration window, which is pretty intuitive, fitted with detailed descriptions.

Note that one requirement is the numpad, so you might find it of little to no use while using it on a laptop without one, and there’s no possibility to change this. It isn’t really a major inconvenience though. Assigning a hotkey requires little effort, because you only need to specify the modifiers to trigger the action.

The active window is positioned to one of nine positions on the desktop. The modifier key can be any of your special keyboard buttons, used in combination with a numpad button. Sadly, windows don’t get resized to fit together, and are simply placed in appropriate positions, which can be a little frustrating on the long run.

A few last words All things considered, we can state that TicTac comes with good intentions, and manages to provide a minimum amount of comfort when managing multiple windows. However, target windows aren’t resized, which still requires some more management efforts.